Warrior in Turbulent Han Dynasty Chapter 537: Deafening
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Remember [Chinese website] in one second, to provide you with high-speed text starting. Guo Shao received a report that the military inspector had cast a cast iron cannon, which he had successfully tested.
He went to the Beiyuan Firearms Workshop to watch in person, with Zan Jurun accompany him. When he reached the place, Guo Shao saw a few short and thick cannons, all cast iron, with six iron rings on the barrels. They looked very strange, completely different from the cannons in his impression; this thing in front of him. , Does not look like a gun, but like a long oil barrel!
Zan Jurun said: “We have been ordered to cast two types of cannons, this one is the largest, weighing five hundred catties! The muzzle diameter is nine inches and six minutes, about 320 millimeters), and the length of the cannon is four feet…”
Guo Shaotou signaled that he was listening carefully, thinking that the ratio of caliber to length was only four to one. No wonder it looked like a barrel. There is also a base at the bottom of the “barrel”, which is used to fix the wooden base of the gun body, so it looks very strange, not like a gun.
Zan Jurun continued: “Can fire more than 100 catties of stone bullets, with a range of 600 steps!”
“Should it be an oblique projectile from the muzzle?” Guo Shao asked immediately. Because of such a thick|short caliber and such a large stone, it is impossible to shoot too far in a flat shot, and it must have hit the ground directly not far out.
Sure enough, Zan Jurun said: “It can only be done like this. It can be fired like a boulder. But the minister thinks that this cannon is far better than a boulder. It has a farther range and a heavier and more powerful stone bullets. Moreover, casting iron cannons costs more than making There are few stone dump trucks, and they are not easy to break; stone dump trucks are easy to damage. The only thing about gunpowder guns is that it is not so easy to load.”
Guo Shao ordered an experiment. All the craftsmen came up to fiddle with the filling, pour the gunpowder in with a dustpan, and then a big man put a round stone in it, and filled the gap tightly. Guo Shao sat down next to the wooden table in the distance, while observing, writing, drawing and calculating. According to Zan Jurun’s description of the size, calculate the spherical volume of the stone bullet according to the volume formula… Then the density of the stone is about three times that of water. Guo Shao quickly estimated that the weight of the stone is indeed a hundred kilograms!
The craftsmen put a paper-wrapped red medicine lead through the hole at the bottom of the cannon and shouted, “Your Majesty, the humble class is going to be on fire!”
Guo Shao put down the brush and plugged his ears with his fingers. After a while, he took a torch and quickly burned it in. Suddenly there was a loud “boom”, the writing brush on the wooden table was shaken, and I saw the muzzle flames spurting out, thick white smoke rising, and a stone moving in the air in a visible trajectory Fly away. After a while, it landed on the grass in the distance.
Guo Shao looked into the distance and saw a brick-and-earth wall as a target. Everyone fired a few more shots one after another, one of which hit the city wall, and the sound of stones hitting could be heard from far away. At this time, Guo Shao turned on his horse and raced to the ground with a group of people to watch. The three big pits on the grass were all hit by stone cannons, and the earth wall in front was hit by a stone. Although it was impossible to collapse, the female wall and the bricks above were all smashed to pieces!
The situation in front of him immediately reminded Guo Shao that this thing can be used to attack cities, better than a stone dump truck.
… Then Guo Shao watched the experiment of another gun. The shape of the cast is similar to the cannon just now, except for a few, weighing only more than fifty catties, and the same as an iron barrel, with a thin wall and hoop.
This type of cannon is used for crushing stones, and it is filled with dozens of crushed stones at one time for area blows.
But the effect of the shotgun is not satisfactory. It can only cover an area twenty steps away, and the coverage width is less than ten steps. No matter how far away it is, there is no lethality, because the gravel flying out of the large-caliber muzzle, the direction Uncertain, some flew upwards, some hit the ground at close distances, and there were not many stones at the correct height just a little farther. It is precisely because of this that the gravel can form an area blow, and if it is all in one direction, the coverage area is narrower.
Guo Shao estimated that if there are cavalry in the front, because the cavalry is relatively sparse to prevent collisions when charging, about one shot can hit two or three cavalry, but the close-range killing of dense infantry may be large.
The shotgun is much less useful than Guo Shao imagined, and it feels less practical; maybe the gun made by the military inspector is not as good as Qi Jiguang’s Tiger Cannon… but it makes sense to think about it. , If the damage of the shotgun is far and wide, what is the value of the fire|gun salvo?
So Guo Shao personally named the cannon that threw the big stone “Long Xiao Cannon”, but didn’t name the cannon that hit the stone.
……
Guo Shao spent a lot of effort, and most of the firearms he produced were not as effective as cold weapons. Only the Long Xiao Cannon was the most useful and could be used to siege the city instead of a stone dumper.
But he still didn’t give up the firearm. The bronze guns cast by the military inspector before have an effective range of 40 steps, and a stronger killer range of 20 steps. When it enters practical production, the firing method is similar to that of artillery. A very hole is drilled in the back and the lead is put into the hole. Then open flames. Then some iron rings with iron thorns were added to the barrel; a handle was cast in the back… I imagined that after firing the lead bullet, it can be used as a mace!
Fire|The gun has completely deviated from Guo Shao’s original intention, and it looks more and more weird, but he can’t help it, because with the current performance, this is more practical.
But he thinks this bronze gun needs to be improved a bit, which is the fire method. It can be imagined how inconvenient it is for one person to take a torch fuse in the battlefield. If the torch goes out, it will really become a complete mace!
Guo Shao thought of matchlock fire. He has given up the flintlock method for the time being, because that part is too difficult to make, and he can’t remember exactly what the structure is, and he can’t figure it out for a while.
The craftsmen of Firearms Workshop can’t make this kind of thing in a short time, because they have never seen it. Guo Shao then designed his own mechanism in the iron shop of the Hall of Grace. The principle to be realized is very simple: it is to use a mechanism to press the burning matchstick into the gunpowder; then realize the firing.
But it’s just such a simple thing. Guo Shao has not figured it out for several evenings, and found a lot of problems… For example, if the match rope is directly pressed into the barrel, the fire hole is relatively large, which affects the air tightness. Further reduce the performance of the fire|gun; and the match rope is exposed near the gunpowder, and it is easy to escape because the gunpowder is on. The ordinary hemp rope or cloth rope burns too fast…
Also, this firing mechanism is not too complicated to say that it is complicated, but if it is placed behind the barrel, if it is used as a mace, it will be easily damaged; it is not easy to take advantage of.
Guo Shao feels a headache. He just feels that even if it is the most backward technology in later generations, it is not easy to make progress. But he was still unwilling to abandon this path, so he had to be patient and slowly explored it by himself and the military inspector.