Lin Gao Qiming

Chapter 1005 Fuze
On the same day, Lin Shenhe and Jiang Ye conducted several mechanical tests on the pressing machine - using an inert powder with physical properties similar to black powder, which proved that all the machines were fully operating normally.Jiang Ye added enough lubrication to all the moving parts to ensure that there would be no problems during operation.

It is not the first time that the mechanical department has manufactured a special pressing machine for pyrotechnics - it was used when making maroon gunpowder propellant powder cake - but it has never been pressed with such high pressure and high density in the past.

Early the next morning, Lin Shenhe and the naturalized migrant workers who volunteered to help him put on the explosion-proof suits and special helmets provided by Panda, and moved to the front of the machine step by step.

The temperature in the room is stable at 13 degrees, and the hygrometer shows that the temperature in the room is 90%.

"Everything is normal." A naturalized migrant worker who specializes in observing thermometers and hygrometers gestured.

Lin Shenhe took a deep breath and opened the sealed barrel containing gunpowder.

Inside the barrel is newly made powdered black powder—the black powder in Lingao is generally granulated for storage: the powdered black powder is prone to precipitation and separation of components in the storage state.

He carefully scooped out the gunpowder from the gunpowder barrel with a copper measuring spoon, and accurately weighed 1000 grams on the balance scale on the table.Put it into a large porcelain container, then pour the *gram*% alcohol solution, and the naturalized migrant worker starts to stir slowly with a wooden stick until it is completely uniform.

"75 grams of charge." Lin Shenhe instructed.So far, everything is normal-this is also the safest stage.Only when it is concluded can we enter the critical step.

According to his instructions, the naturalized migrant worker took out the corresponding mold from the box and fixed it on the base.There are several kinds of molds, corresponding to different grain shapes and qualities, all made of copper.

The stirred black powder powder was accurately weighed and loaded into the mold. Lin Shenhe was worried about the workers and operated the press himself.The pressure device of the press drives the hydraulic cylinder through a manual wheel to slowly exert pressure on the screw.

He turned the wheel slowly and evenly to ensure that the pressure transmission would not be too fast - too fast and too fast would easily cause an explosion.It was stuffy and hot in the explosion-proof suit, and he was very nervous, and he was sweating profusely after a while, which gave him the illusion that the temperature in the room had risen.

"Check the temperature!"

"Temperature 14.5 degrees, humidity 90%! Normal!"

He used a formula to calculate the size of the 75-gram grain column to ensure that it would not be overpressed.However, this is only a theoretical result, and he is not fully sure whether it will be the same in reality.Of course, as the sizes got closer and closer, more and more sweat beads appeared on Lin Shenhe's forehead, and he turned it around a few more times until the medicine surface dropped to the marked line—the first medicine column was formed.

Lin Shenhe carefully took the medicine column out of the mold and put it on a fixed plate-the next thing is to wait for it to dry naturally.

There is a special drying room in the explosives room, but this time it is a trial product with unknown properties, so it cannot be mixed with mass products and dried together.Therefore, the laboratory also has a drying room, where the air humidity and temperature are also controlled, and the powder is naturally dried at a room temperature below 40 degrees.

"Then come the next one!" Lin Shenhe's confidence increased greatly. Since there was no accident in the pressing process, it means that the whole process is no problem.

He also suppressed powder columns of various sizes and qualities, including those to be used to load grenades-the current grenade is nothing more than a large firecracker in terms of power, and its lethality is not worth mentioning. "Shock Grenade".

Another use of the compressed grain is to act as a propellant for rockets. A grain with the same shape and density is an important guarantee for the consistency of the rocket trajectory, which is of great significance.According to his estimation, the range and accuracy of the Hale rocket can be improved to a new level after switching to this new compressed pharmaceutical column.

Of course, the biggest use of the high-density black powder column is to load shells, so that the grenade that was originally purely for decoration can be used to a new level of power.Lin Shenhe believes that although the 12-pound and 24-pound smoothbore guns widely used by the current army have the advantages of being simple to manufacture and use, and suitable for low-tech troops, in the long run, the power of the smoothbore guns is relatively small, and the guns have a low rate of fire. The disadvantages are insurmountable, and it is not "useful for 20 years" as some people boast.

Large-scale manufacturing and equipping rifled artillery was an inevitable choice for the military system of the Senate.Right now, only the navy and coastal artillery use some rifled guns, both front-mounted and rear-mounted, but none of them have formed standard equipment, only sporadic installations, with an experimental nature.The main reason is that in addition to the cost, the chamber pressure of the rifled gun is much higher than that of the smoothbore gun.Spherical grenades cannot be fuzed on rifled guns, so all rifled guns to date have only used solid shells.

The conical solid projectile fired by the rifled gun has far less lethal effect than the spherical projectile of the smoothbore gun-the latter can also play a lethal role in jumping and rolling after landing, and the conical solid projectile is directly inserted into the ground.The advantage is that the penetrating power is extremely strong, and it is very powerful against city defense fortifications and warships.
In order for the rifled gun to exert sufficient power, the fuze must first be resolved.

Taking advantage of the drying time of the powder column, Lin Shenhe found someone to make the fuze.

Lin Shenhe has always wanted to solve the fuze problem.The main problem he faced: the material branch in the Senate industrial system was in a bad state.And to make a safe and reliable fuze, it is necessary to use a spring.

Spring was an inconspicuous handicraft in old times and space, but in Lingao, manufacturing spring is an out-and-out high-tech.The springs that can be used in the fuze of rifled guns are the crystallization of industrial technology: including various special technologies in iron and steel smelting, alloy materials and heat treatment.Lingao's industry can also produce springs, but they are extremely low-end products from materials to manufacturing, which are barely enough for simple applications such as carriages and sofas-it is nothing more than a shorter service life and more frequent replacement .When used on artillery shells, they will not explode on the ground, affecting operations, or explode suddenly, causing major accidents.

Because of this problem, although Lin Shenhe, Wang Ruixiang, and all kinds of veteran military enthusiasts have tried to solve this problem, but none of them have succeeded-no matter what the idea is, the final one cannot overcome the "qualified" problem. The spring" of this threshold.

Fuzes are consumables, and the cost must be low enough to be mass-produced and used.At the same time, the level of mechanical processing workers in the Senate is generally not high. It is necessary to reduce the technical difficulty in processing and production as much as possible to ensure uniform production quality.

Lin Shenhe read a lot of information on this issue, and finally decided to refer to the fuze of Japan's Type 91 grenade for design.This is a type of explosive collision with a simple structure, relying on the inertia of the projectile moving forward when hitting the target to overcome the resistance of the anti-crawling spring to achieve ignition.The insurance measure is the safety pin pulled out before launching.The entire fuze design only needs one anti-creep spring, and the performance requirements of the spring are not high.It is very suitable for Lingao's current industrial capacity.

In this fuze, the detonating fuse is located at the bottom of the fuze, and the front end of the fuze is a long rod-shaped inertial body with a firing pin.The inertial body is isolated by anti-creep springs and detonating fuses and secured with safety pins inserted transversely.In order to ensure the firing rate, the inertial body is a long rod-shaped structure with a crown plate on the top.Before launching, pull out the safety pin, and the fuze will immediately release the safety and enter the combat state.When the gun is fired, the inertial body stays at the front end under the action of the anti-crawling spring to ensure that no premature detonation occurs; after impacting the target, the anti-crawling spring is compressed by the inertia of the projectile, and the firing pin hits the ignition part to detonate the fuze.

The machinery factory quickly manufactured a hundred fuzes according to his design drawings-half were made by veterans, and half were made by naturalized skilled workers.Lin Shenhe wanted to know the pass rate of naturalized skilled workers during the official production.

According to the results of visual inspection and simple experiments, the naturalized migrant workers have a pass rate of about 40%.This ratio can roughly be accepted by Lin Shenhe-now it is assembled by hand, and a large amount of specialized craft equipment is used in mass production, and the pass rate will be greatly improved after the workers are skilled.

Lin Shenhe believes that according to his shooting, the performance requirements of the fuze against the creeping spring itself are not high, and the highest-grade spring phosphor bronze spring currently produced by Lingao should be able to do it.He did dozens of tests in the laboratory with the fuse of the phosphor bronze spring-every time the phosphor bronze spring responded correctly.

However, there is no special equipment in the laboratory that can simulate the high temperature and high pressure environment when the shell is launched, nor can it simulate the high overload condition of the shell in flight.A simple counterweight landing test cannot reflect the true performance of the fuze.Lingao's military engineers could only use the simplest method: live ammunition shooting to test their designs.

Lin Shenhe borrowed a rifled gun from Ying Yu—this was one of the first 8154mm breech-loaded rifled guns manufactured by the military industry department for the four 70 ships.It has been sealed since it was removed from the ship.

Since the 70mm rifled gun had never produced grenades, Lin Shenhe first found a machinery factory to make [-] grenades, installed fuzes, and used sand as a counterweight for the explosives.

He carefully marked and separated the shells equipped with fuzes made by veterans and fuzes made by naturalized people, and then borrowed a horse to drag the artillery to the shooting range and started experimental shooting.

Lin Shenhe personally acted as the gunner, and the propellant used was maroon powder with better shooting safety. For the first time, Lin Shenhe did not use the full charge, but only the weak charge.

The shooting range sites are hard soil, medium soil and wetland environment. The first round of shooting has achieved good results. After eliminating the failure factors caused by the manufacturing quality of the fuze itself, the hard and medium soil , The fuze has achieved a firing rate of 90%, and has also achieved a firing rate of more than 70% in wetland environments.Judging from the actual combat effect, it is completely qualified-the average detonation rate of grenades fired by smoothbore guns is only [-]%.

(End of this chapter)