Chapter 65 Artillery (4)
"There may not be so many people who would choose to serve as soldiers if there is a peaceful life to live. Being a soldier in this era is not a good way out." Ning Qi was not so reassured about the plan of the Military and Police Department: "Don't make the soldiers useless. Recruit them all, and finally become a strong man.”
"You can rest assured about this." Tao Donglai said confidently: "There is no good way out, that is the army of the Ming Dynasty. You have to know that what we can give to the soldiers is not just meager military pay and two meals of gruel a day. .”
In the planning of the Military and Police Department, future naturalized civilian soldiers will have a special social status, and this social status will not only be obtained because they are in the violent institution of the military, but the relevant departments must go through long-term publicity and concepts Instill and establish a tall and positive image of military personnel in mainstream social culture. As long as you choose to join the naturalized civilian army, your future military pay, medical care, education, post-retirement employment, starting a family, children's schooling, pensions for disabled soldiers, pensions for soldiers killed in battle, etc., will all receive special support from the Executive Committee. Assure.
Of course, even if the Military and Police Department can complete the recruitment of indigenous soldiers as planned, these new recruits will not be put into use immediately. There will be at least a training period of about a month so that these people understand what military orders are and what soldiers are. The military and police departments are anxious to expand, which is part of the reason. As for real tactical training, people in the Military and Police Department understand that it will be a long-term process and there is no need to rush it.
"Aren't there a lot of people clamoring to join the commune recently? After we collect this batch of soldiers, you can just recruit a group of people from the current migrant workers to join the commune." Tao Dong came to see Ning Qi and his face was not very good, so he hurriedly Come up with an idea for him.
"Okay, you don't need to persuade me anymore. I still understand that the overall situation is the most important thing. Aren't we going to send people to set up a point in Yazhou City in a few days? Let them keep an eye on that kid Luo Shengdong, and hurry up Bring people over from Yazhou." Ning Qi finally chose to compromise. This is not a dispute between departments. Ning Qi can still tell what is more important.
Early the next morning, a group of red-eyed old men gathered in the metallurgical workshop one after another, preparing to participate in the trial production of the first artillery piece. It's said to be a workshop, but it's actually just a reinforced thatched shed, with the ceiling raised a lot just to prevent fire. But even so, the people who came here to visit the space were still staring at their heads from time to time, fearing that a little spark would float up and ignite the roof.
In the early 17th century, China's cannon casting technology was still very primitive, mainly using the clay mold casting method. This casting method is very troublesome, and the mold made of water and mud takes more than a month to dry. Moreover, a clay mold can only cast one cannon, which cannot be reused, and the scrap rate is extremely high. Only 23 out of 10 usable cannons can be cast, so the efficiency of cannon casting is quite low. Methods such as adding reinforcing ribs to the clay mold, baking the clay mold, and boring the gun bore are completely unknown to Chinese gunsmiths in this era.
Another biggest disadvantage of this clay mold casting method is that the manufacturing dimensions cannot be truly unified. The biggest consequence of such non-standardized production is that the diameter of the muzzle and the thickness of the barrel are often different, resulting in logistical supply problems. This greatly increased the difficulty. In extreme cases, individual shells had to be cast for each gun to meet normal firing requirements. In addition, the thickness of the gun barrel is different, which also leads to slight deviations in the charge of each gun. Only the exclusive gunner of this gun will gradually master the relationship between charge, range and angle of fire through several live rounds. relationship between. In this way, if the gunner is damaged during the battle, even if a substitute gunner is replaced, the combat effectiveness of the gun will be greatly reduced because he does not understand the performance of the gun enough.
Even with such a backward technology, the skill of making food was regarded as a secret by the cannon makers. As a result, the cannon-making technology did not make qualitative progress for a long time, so that in the Yuan Dynasty, metal bodies began to be equipped. The Central Dynasty, which was in charge of artillery, had to import such weapons by the late Ming Dynasty from Europeans who were originally far behind in technology. Therefore, when determining the cannon-making process, Chuangchuanzhong skipped the clay mold cannon casting method and chose the iron mold cannon casting method that was more advanced and easier to achieve standardized and rapid production.
Liu Xingli's professionalism is undoubtedly extremely high. He didn't rest at all after last night's meeting. He led several people in the metallurgical team to make two sets of cast iron gun molds for 6-pound guns overnight. They even rushed to polish the surfaces of the two sets of iron molds with coarse sand before dawn, which made a group of people from the Military and Police Department give a heartfelt thumbs up.
Yan Chujie even excitedly patted Liu Xingli on the shoulder and said, "This is the attitude of revolution!"
The group of people who came today said they were participating in trial production, but actually it is more accurate to describe them as watching. Although most of the people here have played with guns, and many of them have killed people in the first two battles, no one dares to operate the large furnace of red-hot molten iron.
Technical work must still be completed by professionals. Liu Xingli explained to everyone while operating: "Now we are painting the inside of the mold with slurry. This recipe was found in the database. The slurry is divided into two layers. The first layer is It is made of fine rice husk ash and fine sand mud, and the second layer is made of fine fine kiln coal mixed with water." After brushing, several people came up and closed the two halves of the iron mold together, and then used iron hoops. Tighten it from the outside and slowly heat the iron mold over a fire. After assembling the iron mold section by section, Liu Xingli ordered the pouring to begin.
The metallurgical workshop currently uses a mini-crane as a crane for lifting crucibles. This mini-crane produced by Maeda Company looks like a spider when it is working. The support pillars extending in four directions are like four long legs, helping the little crane to lift the crucible. The small body stabilizes the center of gravity. This crane is so small that it doesn’t even have a cab. The operator can only sit in a small seat at the back of the truck. The maximum lifting capacity is only three tons. The original purpose of preparing this mini-crane is not to be a substitute for the current driving, but to hoist water turbine generators in hydropower station projects. In addition, it is also a few metal processing machine tools that have not been put to use in the material warehouse at that time. This crane must be used for lifting.
As for the special lifting equipment in the metallurgical workshop, the mechanical department chose to use steam engine power with mature technology. The design task has been completed. The first batch of produced steam engines will be assembled for the metallurgical and mining departments. Of course, the current simple workshop must be renovated by then, and at least a few strong load-bearing columns must be built before the lifting equipment can be installed.
The small crane arm slowly lifted the graphite crucible filled with red-hot molten iron, moved it above the iron mold, and slowly poured the molten iron into the casting port. Although the onlookers were standing more than ten meters away, they still felt a wave of heat coming from the ground.
Liu Xingli wore a protective mask, a safety helmet, a mask, a full set of insulating clothing, insulating gloves, and high-temperature-resistant shoes. He stood about three meters away from the iron mold and stared motionlessly at the casting process. Only when the thin stream of molten iron remaining in the graphite crucible could fill the iron mold did Liu Xingli blow the whistle in his mouth, and the casting colleague immediately adjusted the angle of the graphite crucible and stopped casting. The crane moved slowly, and then began to cast the second set of iron molds. Finally, more than thirty spherical cannonballs were cast with the remaining molten iron.
After the two sets of iron molds were cast, Liu Xingli took off the whistle from his mouth and returned to where everyone was watching. In just a few minutes, Liu Xingli was already so hot that he was sweating profusely, which showed that the temperature where he was standing was very high just now. Someone nearby immediately handed him a glass of cold water, and Liu Xingli was not polite. After taking off his mask, he took it and drank most of it. Then he wiped the corners of his mouth and said, "Today is too tight, and I don't have time to do the central cooling method. I need to use it." That kind of cannon casting method requires separate processing of the core, which is a bit more troublesome. It will be used when the cannon is finalized and produced.”
The so-called central cooling method is to use running water to dissipate heat inside the core to accelerate the cooling of the barrel, so that the inside of the barrel can be hardened first. When the outer metal of the barrel shrinks inward when it cools, the metal structure of the entire barrel becomes It is stronger and can greatly reduce the phenomenon of barrel cracks caused by uneven cooling and heat dissipation when casting the gun. The small 6-pound cannon currently being cast is fine. Even if it is really scrapped, it will only cost 500 kilograms of pig iron. But if a large-diameter heavy cannon is cast, the wall of the barrel will be much thicker than that of the 6-pound cannon. After casting, it will be easy to Uneven cooling will occur. Without this method, it will be difficult to control the scrap rate.
This casts a useless cannon, which is a trivial matter. The key is that the cast iron that has been used once cannot be used to cast cannons again. It can only be used to make iron farm tools. In this regard, cast iron cannons are inferior to bronze cannons. Bronze can be cast and used repeatedly, so there are not so many worries in the cannon casting process. However, considering the current pitiful copper reserves of the Executive Committee, it does not dare to have such wishful thinking for the time being.
Liu Xingli only rested for a moment before ordering the mold to be removed. Someone asked: "Is it too fast to dismantle it now? The barrel should not be cold yet, right?"
"It will be troublesome when it gets cold." Liu Xingli explained: "This kind of casting will definitely have some burrs. We need to remove these burrs before the cannon has cooled down, and also clean the mud core in the barrel. ”
This process was soon completed, and the visitors finally saw the two freshly baked cannons, which were exactly as black and thick as everyone imagined, and also emitted bursts of burning smell.
"Come on, let's see if our two cannons can stand the test." Seeing that the two cannons were intact, Liu Xingli finally let out a sigh of relief.
(End of chapter)