Chapter 373 Father and son work together
"Prepare some guns and let's go to the shooting range."
Joseph signaled to Martinier, and was about to carry the newly completed bulletproof inserts for field testing when he heard Eman saying from the side: "His Royal Highness, the King is here."
Joseph hurriedly turned around and saw Louis XVI walking into the work shed with a proud smile: "Well, my dear Joseph, you will appear here, I guess you must have invented something interesting."
Then, he muttered with some resentment: "Why don't you ask me to come with you? We are the best partners.
"Oh, forget it, let me see what good things my genius son has come up with first..."
However, when he took the bulletproof insert from Joseph, he frowned slightly: "Is this an iron plate?"
"This is not a simple iron plate." Joseph pulled his father towards the shooting range. "It can withstand bullets."
Louis XVI weighed the bulletproof insert in his hand in disbelief: "This thing only weighs 3 pounds at most. Oh, the standard measurement has been changed now. It should be 1.5 kilograms. How can it stop bullets?"
As a "science and engineering geek", he is still involved in armor and the like. Even breastplates weighing more than 10 kilograms will often be penetrated if the angle of incidence of the bullet is vertical.
And the prince actually wanted to use such a thin thing to block the bullets!
“You’ll know just by looking at it.”
Joseph gave his father a mysterious smile, then ordered the guards to fix the bulletproof inserts on the wooden gun target, and then took a percussion cap gun from Martinier - newly produced by the Royal Ordnance Factory. Completed school shooting.
Joseph came 60 steps away from the gun target, pulled the trigger, installed a flash cap, and squinted at the bulletproof insert in the distance.
There was a loud "bang" sound. Missed the target.
Joseph awkwardly reloaded, raised his gun and fired again.
"Bang"! Still missing the target.
This is not because his shooting skills are poor. In the era of muskets, whether you can hit a target 60 steps away largely depends on your character.
Finally, after the flash cap gun sounded for the third time, the bulletproof insert in the distance visibly trembled.
Two soldiers from the shooting range immediately ran over and carried the gun target.
Louis XVI curiously stepped forward to check and saw that a large piece of the iron plate was dented, but it was obviously not penetrated!
He immediately looked at Joseph in shock: "How is this possible? It's only such a thin piece!"
Joseph was not surprised. He had just set the shooting distance at 60 steps, which still left a lot of margin. According to his idea, the insert should be able to block the British Brown Bess 1777 flintlock gun from 30 paces away.
He smiled and took off the bulletproof insert from the gun target, and explained to his father: "Dear father, actually this thing is not just a piece of iron."
He pointed to the insert that had been delaminated by the huge impact: "Look, there are porcelain pieces behind the iron piece."
"Porcelain shards? What purpose can such a brittle thing do?"
“Disperse the impact of the bullet,” Joseph said. “You can see from the edges that the porcelain pieces are broken.
“Because the cracks extend in the horizontal direction, they can disperse vertical impulses in the horizontal direction.
"And behind this is a layer of silk. Silk is extremely tough and can cover the first two layers, preventing them from being torn apart by instantaneous deformation." As for the last layer of iron, it is used to improve reliability. You see, there are only slight marks left on it. "
Louis XVI's eyes widened, he looked over and over at the bulletproof insert in his hand, and nodded constantly: "The simplest structure often has unexpectedly excellent performance. Joseph, how did you come up with this idea?" It’s just so… amazing!”
Joseph thought that of course he saw it from the documentary, but he still followed the old routine and crossed himself on his chest: "I think this must be a revelation from God."
When Louis XVI heard this, he immediately crossed himself with great piety: "Thank you to the Almighty God!"
In the past two years, as his son has continued to receive "God's revelations," he has become a hundred times more pious than before.
Joseph said something on the side that shocked him even more: "This bulletproof insert should still have some power. Let's shorten the distance to 50 steps and try again."
The new inserts were fixed in place. Joseph gave his father the gun.
As thick smoke spewed out from the muzzle, Louis XVI accurately hit the bulletproof insert with one shot, and then raised his eyebrows somewhat showily at his son who had only hit the target three times before.
The soldiers quickly brought the gun targets. Joseph hurriedly stepped forward to check the insert. The crater was deeper than before, but it was still not penetrated.
He turned the insert over and saw that there was only an almost invisible dent on the back of the last layer of iron. Obviously, the wearer's life would not be in any danger.
This time, before he could say anything, Louis XVI spoke first: "Perhaps, we can get closer."
As the test continued, it was not until the shooting distance was shortened to 28 steps that the bulletproof insert was finally penetrated.
After that, Louis XVI and his son continued to test bulletproof inserts made in several other models. When it got dark, they slept together in the ordnance factory, and talked about various firearms and machinery topics until two in the morning. many.
In the next few days, the father and son spent time in the ordnance factory, conducting a series of tests and improvements on all combinations and different materials of bulletproof inserts, and finally determined several types for mass production.
Joseph looked at the production process documents in his hand and ordered Martinier: "Produce 6,000 pieces of the general-purpose type first. 2,000 pieces of the heavy-duty type. 500 pieces of the high-quality type."
After several days of testing, he found that the soft lead bullets used in the 18th century could not be used with double-layer iron plates.
So under his father's suggestion, he used a structure of iron sheets, cotton, ceramics, and silk to control the weight of the bulletproof insert to 1.05 kilograms, which can stably withstand flintlock fire from 40 steps away.
This "universal" bulletproof insert has the lowest price, costing only 5 livres and 16 sous. If necessary, even silk can be omitted, and the price plummets to less than 4 livres, but the bulletproof distance also drops to 55 steps.
The "heavy-duty" insert is the first structure tested before. It has double-layered iron plates at the front and rear, weighs 1.4 kilograms, can be penetrated by a flintlock gun at a distance of 28 steps, and is specially used by cavalry. Cost 6 livres 10 sous.
The "high-quality type" is a single-layer iron sheet with a double-layer silk. It weighs about the same as the general-purpose type and has a stable bulletproof distance of 33 steps. However, the price is as high as 8 livres and 5 sous, and it can generally only be equipped for officers.
In fact, Joseph originally planned to directly produce more than 100,000 tablets and distribute them to all members of the Guards Corps. However, adhesive bottlenecks limited his ambitions.
Although casein gum has excellent performance, it can only be produced in small doses and is expensive. As for other natural adhesives, they are basically useless.
Joseph recalled the various phenolic adhesives of later generations, and his desire to promote gas street lamps as soon as possible to light up the organic chemical industry became stronger.
(End of chapter)