I want to be emperor

In October of the 25th year of Chengshun, Luo Zhixue, who had just watched the training of the Guards in Jinling City, took a group of generals to the weapons testing ground next door.

Today's event is not only the Guards exercise, but also a link to watch all kinds of new weapons.

Luo Zhixue has always attached great importance to military equipment. In addition to inspections at arsenals, Luo Zhixue will also regularly hold exhibitions and experiments on new weapons.

This is the case today. Taking advantage of the time when he came out to inspect the Guards exercise, the defense industry also wanted to show His Majesty the research results of these years and obtain His Majesty's approval.

After all, what kind of weapons the military will purchase, although each branch of the military decides on its own, there is still an emperor Luo Zhixue on top. If a new type of weapon can be approved by His Majesty, then orders will come rushing in.

Therefore, today's occasion has been highly valued by the seven major weapon companies. All kinds of new equipment have been pulled over, not to mention, even some conceptual weapons that are still in the research stage have been pulled out.

In this way, Luo Zhixue also saw a wide variety of equipment, not only weapons, but also a large number of various military equipment.

The visit is carried out according to the category. The first thing you see after entering the venue is the gun venue. All kinds of guns and ammunition are the core weapons of the Great Chu Empire's military.

Its importance is comparable to that of artillery and warships.

Therefore, in the exhibitions over the years, firearms and corresponding ammunition are all in one venue.

After entering the firearms venue, Luo Zhixue glanced over and saw hundreds of different types of firearms, including rifles, lances, and pistols.

At this moment, Minister of Industry Ji Dehua was beside Luo Zhixue, introducing the basic situation. This person had already been appointed as a military and political counselor in the imperial study for a year, and became one of the nine most powerful counselors in the Great Chu Empire.

For an official to reach this level, the actual position has no way to be promoted, because if he goes up, he will be Luo Zhixue's emperor's throne...

However, there are still many things that need to be competed, such as the power struggle in the imperial study, some disputes over political ideas, and false titles and honors.

For example, the current Ji Dehua, as the minister of affairs, was conferred the title of first-rank prince and grand master last year, which is also a title generally available to ministers of affairs.

But whether it can go further, to be awarded the title of "junior teacher" or even the "grand teacher" representing the highest honor of civil servants depends on the results.

At present, the ministers of the Great Chu Empire are generally granted the title of first-rank prince and grand teacher when they are in office, officials of the judicial system are awarded the title of prince and tutor, and military generals are awarded the title of prince and Taibao.

Generally speaking, the title of Yipin is the limit.

However, there are also a small number of ministers who can take their titles further through their outstanding achievements, and then become the first-rank masters, masters, and treasures, and there are very few people who can or are more senior masters, masters, and treasures .

For example, Guo Quanshu, the former Grand Master of the Great Chu Empire, Minister of Counseling, and long-term minister of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, was awarded the title of Grand Master by Luo Zhixue in recognition of his more than 20 years of career as the Dragon Queen before he was unable to become an official due to serious illness at the beginning of this year. He worked diligently and was loyal to the king.

Grand Master, this is the top title that a civil servant in the Great Chu Empire can obtain.

Of course, this is also due to the fact that Guo Quanshu's health is already very bad. According to the Tai Hospital, he may not last long. As a monarch, Luo Zhixue naturally knows what Guo Quanshu will never forget in his life.

It's nothing more than wanting the highest honor of a courtier, the position of Grand Master!

This is a veteran courtier who followed behind him to fight the country. He hasn't made any mistakes in the past 20 years.

For such a courtier, Luo Zhixue naturally wouldn't let him die with regrets.

Therefore, before he became seriously ill and became an official, he was awarded the title of Grand Master, and became the only Grand Master in the political arena of the Great Chu Empire who was still alive.

Luo Zhixue had conferred the title of Grand Master several times before, but it was either posthumously conferred or conferred upon dying.This also led to the fact that Guo Quanshu was the only grand master who was still alive in the Great Chu Empire.

And Ji Dehua, as a civil servant, naturally wants to be like Guo Quanshu one day, and get the title of Grand Master before he dies... Well, although the possibility is not high, as a human being, one has to pursue something, right?

He is already an extremely human minister, if he doesn't pursue the grand master, to be honest, he has nothing to pursue, he can't rebel, right?

And this point, Luo Zhixue is also very clear... So in so many years, he has only awarded five Grand Master titles!
Only Guo Quanshu was awarded during his lifetime, and the other four were awarded posthumously.

Not to mention grand masters, even Luo Zhixue, a junior master, is very strict in control and rarely conferred.

He had to increase the difficulty of being promoted to grand master or junior master, and the ultimate civil title of grand master, even if a courtier has the qualifications, he has to wait until he dies to confer it posthumously. The greatest grace is to grant it when you are about to die.

The difficulty of the little teacher is lower, but it is also super difficult.

If these two titles are awarded early, what will he reward his courtiers in the future?

For a ruler, the most fearful thing is not that his subjects will make meritorious deeds, but that he is afraid of being unsealable!
For the same reason, the title of Taifu in the judicial system and the title of Taibao for generals are extremely difficult.

The three top titles of the three imperial divisions, regardless of civil and military, regardless of how much credit you have made, but if you are not dead or are about to die, don't count on it.

At the same time, these three top titles are to some extent Luo Zhixue's final conclusion on a political tycoon.

Don’t count on these three titles if you haven’t made extraordinary political achievements, and you won’t be given them even if you die...

As one of the current top civil servants of the Great Chu Empire, Ji Dehua naturally hopes that one day he will be able to win the highest honor of a courtier, so that he will have no regrets in his life.

Although it is very difficult, it is not impossible. For example, if you can be awarded the title of Young Master while serving as the Minister of Counselor, then you may be awarded the title of Grand Master when you are dying.

For the title of a junior teacher, Ji Dehua has been busy every day for the past few years, worrying about the industrial development of the Great Chu Empire.

The national defense industry is also a development direction that Ji Dehua focuses on.

After all, the quality of the national defense industry is directly related to the combat effectiveness of the empire's three armies, as well as the empire's external expansion. This is an important industry that will directly affect the global strategy of the Great Chu Empire, and Ji Dehua has to care about it.

It can even be said that the national defense industry is actually the most important structure of the Ministry of Industry, because the Ministry of Industry of the Great Chu Empire is said to be an administrative agency, but in fact it is essentially a group company...

Its subordinate business has three major categories, the first is very special weapons manufacturing, the second is industrial basic industries such as coal mines, steel, chemicals, shipbuilding, machinery, etc., and the third is some infrastructure industries related to people's livelihood, such as Shipping, public transportation in various cities, water supply, docks, urban construction, etc.

The defense industry is not just the seven major weapons companies, but actually includes steel, machinery, chemicals, shipbuilding and so on.

To some extent, the seven major weapons companies are actually assembly factories. The materials they use are provided by major steel companies and chemical companies, and the equipment they use is provided by major machinery companies.

The national defense industry is not independent, but is rooted in the entire industrial system of the Great Chu Empire. Only with a strong industrial system can a behemoth like the Hantian battleship be manufactured!
With the support of the entire industrial system, Dangtu Arsenal, a subsidiary of Jiangnan Arms Company, was able to produce a prototype of the Mini rifle in the laboratory production mode at a huge cost.

In this way, the miniature rifles that Luo Zhixue saw today came into existence.

Without the support of the entire industrial system, a Dangtu Arsenal alone would not be able to produce such top-level industrial products that almost represent the materials and finishing fields of the Great Chu Empire.

Don't look at it as just a front-loading rifle, but the requirements of this thing on the industrial system are no less than that of a high-pressure steam engine.

The mini rifles in front of me are veritable industrial flowers.

It was precisely because of their prominence that they became Luo Zhixue's first inspection target today.

Looking at the three prototypes of Mini rifles on the table in front of him, Luo Zhixue said hello several times in succession.

Even if he is very clear that this kind of rifle cannot be mass-produced with the current technical level of the Great Chu Empire, and the price of small-scale laboratory production is sky-high, but this is not important.

Because the technology will continue to improve, it cannot be mass-produced now, maybe it will be ready in three to five years?
The important thing is that now that the sample gun has been produced, he will be able to make the generals behind him realize the huge tactical and even strategic role of the rifled rifle in advance.

This front-loading rifle produced by Dangtu Arsenal was named 'Frontline Sixteen Rifle', which is a design code.

It is worth noting that this rifle was not designed by Dangtu Arsenal, but by experts from the Firearms Research Institute directly under the Ministry of Industry. The code name is actually the No. 16 front-loading rifle.

The front line does not mean the front line of war, but the abbreviation of the front-loading rifle.

After Luo Zhixue picked up the Type 21 rifle, he found that the weight and dimensions of the gun were similar to those of the Type 21 percussion rifle, and the bolt mechanism was also a typical cap firing mechanism of the Type [-].

But there is an obvious difference in the scale. Luo Zhixue saw the scale above, and the marked distance was up to 300 meters. This is completely different from the distance of the previous smoothbore gun, which was only [-] meters.

In fact, there is no need to set the ruler of the musket gun too far, because the accuracy of the musket gun is too poor, and the shooting accuracy after a distance of more than 100 meters cannot be guaranteed. As for the distance of more than 300 meters, there is no need to aim at all. Can't hit...

However, rifled guns are different. Rifled guns can ensure shooting accuracy within hundreds of meters. If covering shooting is performed, hundreds of meters are also possible.

This is also the reason why the Type [-] rifle has a full kilometer scale.

None of the above is the biggest feature of this rifle. Its biggest feature is that there are three rifling lines in the barrel of this rifle!

These three rifling lines are actually not the essence of this rifle. It is just a rifling line, which is not too difficult for the technology industry of the Great Chu Empire.

The real point is that when Luo Zhixue put a hollow buckshot on the side into the muzzle, the gap between the buckshot and the barrel was very small.

The gap between the bullet and the barrel is not only extremely small, but also requires that all guns and bullets can be used with each other, and the tolerance should be controlled to an extremely small degree. This is the essence of this rifle and the real technology of rifled rifles Difficulties, the biggest challenge to the industrial circles of the Great Chu Empire.

And these are actually invisible to the naked eye!
Many of them are explained by the technical experts next to them, saying that in order to control the error, they specially use laboratory equipment for processing... And this kind of laboratory equipment is not ordinary industrial equipment, they are all customized by Hantian Machinery Company , the price of one set is tens of thousands, and the processing output is also extremely low...

Because this thing is a laboratory equipment, the pursuit is the ultimate precision, not the output.

If Luo Zhixue hadn't asked the laboratory to produce hundreds of front-loading rifles, and the Guards directly used the reserve funds, they would have given them a full 30 Chu Yuan.

Killing Dangtu Armory Factory is not willing to use these sophisticated laboratory equipment to produce rifles...that is equipment worth 10,000+ Chu Yuan...who would dare to waste it like this in normal times.

The production of this batch of sixteen rifles not only consumes expensive equipment life, but also has very high requirements for materials. This barrel is not comparable to the barrels of the previous smoothbore guns.

Well... Although the barrel material of the smoothbore gun can also be made... but the equipment cost of 10,000+ has been invested, so I am not afraid of wasting tens of thousands of Chu Yuan to use more advanced materials to make the barrel.

The barrels of this batch are all directly made of the most advanced steel materials at present, and the drilling process is adopted.

After this series, these sixteen-type rifles seem to be ugly, but they represent the top materials and processing technology of the Great Chu Empire.

After such a toss, in fact, the production cost of these hundreds of Type [-] rifles has reached a very terrifying level.

If it hadn't been for the guards who took the lead to pay the bill, Dangtu Armory would not have engaged in such a loss-making business.

Luo Zhixue took the Type [-] rifle in his hand and looked at it carefully, then put it down, and said, "Arrange someone to try this rifle!"

Although Luo Zhixue knew that the performance of this gun was very good, he had never seen it with his own eyes, so he still wanted to see the actual shooting test.

In today's inspection occasion, various live ammunition tests are naturally indispensable. The Guards have already negotiated and arranged with the Ministry of Industry.

Soon, soldiers of the Guards stepped forward and began to design live ammunition against the targets ahead.

Although this thing is a rifled rifle, it is still a front-loading rifle. Although the bullets used are special expansion lead bullets, the loading process is no different from that of the 21-year percussion gun.

After the soldiers finished loading, they shot at the target about [-] meters in front of them. After ten shots, it was reported that ten of the ten bullets hit the target accurately. Naturally, this achievement was not achieved by ordinary soldiers. The soldiers who fired live ammunition were all carefully selected musketeers from the guards. They were already quite good at marksmanship, and they had actually been trained with this miniature rifle before.

Well, that's right, before Luo Zhixue's inspection, the Type [-] rifle had actually been tested many times with live ammunition, and the test results were quite good, so this rifle appeared in front of Luo Zhixue and was used as a test for today's inspection. the main event.

Subsequently, the target distance was extended to 200 meters, 300 meters, or even 400 meters or even five meters for live ammunition testing.

The results are quite good. Although the hit rate at the 400-meter distance is not high, and there is no hit at all at 500 meters, it is still a very outstanding result, because at the 300-meter target, it still maintains a good performance. accuracy.

And the distance of 500 meters failed to get a hit. This is not to say that the gun is not strong, but more of the limitations of the human body itself.

This has nothing to do with the accuracy of the marksmanship, because the human line of sight is limited. At a distance of 500 meters, the target is actually very small, and it is not easy to see clearly, let alone aim and shoot accurately.

Even in the 21st century, when infantry adopts rifles with higher precision, it is difficult to hit a target 500 meters away without a scope. This distance is usually the shooting distance of a sniper.

This elite soldier of the Guards, without the assistance of a high-magnification scope, used a Type 300 rifle, which is far from accurate in the eyes of later generations, to be able to maintain a distance of [-] meters with only a ruler and a crosshair. With a relatively high hit rate, this is already considered a genius shooter!
Needless to say, I know that I must have gone through intensive live ammunition shooting training of the [-]-type sample gun before, and I can do this only after mastering some characteristics of this rifle.

Through the live ammunition test, we can basically know that the accurate and effective range of this rifle is only about 300 meters. Of course, if it is an actual combat formation and uses intensive barrage to kill, this distance can be relaxed to 400 meters or even 500 meters. .

Because in many cases, dozens or even hundreds of soldiers lined up and fired at a large target, such as the enemy's formation.

At this time, the effective range is much farther than the accurate shooting range of a single person and a single gun... If you use it boldly and don't pursue the crowd rate too much, you can even reach a range of hundreds of meters... This range is better than those of the natives. The effective range of the artillery will be farther.

Among the series of 115mm field guns specially exported by the Great Chu Empire, the performance is the best, and only a few special indigenous countries are supplied with high-end artillery. The effective range of the exported 800mm field gun is only 115 meters.

This Type [-] rifle, in actual combat, can use intensive firepower to directly carry out devastating blows to the enemy's artillery...

In Luo Zhixue's opinion, the performance of this Type [-] rifle was quite good.

It is a pity that the output is too low and the cost is too high, so it cannot be equipped in large quantities for the time being. We can only build a test camp for front-loading rifles first.

However, when technology improves in the future, Luo Zhixue will definitely equip the army with rifled weapons on a large scale, but by then it may not be a front-loading rifle like the Mini rifle, but a breech-loading rifle.

Because now, in fact, there are already samples of breech-loading rifles, and they are in the booth next to the Type [-] rifle booth.

It also belongs to the design work of the Firearms Research Institute. In the field of firearms research, the Firearms Research Institute of the Ministry of Industry of the Great Chu Empire is still very strong.

"This breech-loading rifle is our improvement and development on the basis of the Type [-] front-loading rifle. It follows the three-rifling structure of the Type [-] rifle, and the tail structure adopts a bolt-action locking structure."

"In terms of ammunition, we use a newly developed integrated paper shell ammunition. This integrated ammunition combines the cap, propellant and bullets. When shooting, you only need to load the bullets into it, and then buckle it. Just pull the trigger to fire!"

Luo Zhixue looked at the rifle in front of him, and felt that it was almost the same as the single-shot bolt-action rifles he knew. It seemed that the technicians finally adopted his own opinion and developed the aftermarket with the bolt-action structure as the main. rifled rifle.

It's just that even the front-loading rifles haven't been developed yet, and the breech-loading rifles can be produced. How do they solve the problem of holding their breath?And the carton remnants of the paper ammo?Many problems such as black powder residue?
Nowadays, if you want to make a rear-loading rifle, you need to solve a lot more problems than a front-loading rifle.

Sure enough, after careful questioning, the technicians on the side said that this is just a concept product and cannot be used for live ammunition shooting, because the air leakage problem is still relatively serious, and they are still studying how to further reduce the air leakage.

When Luo Zhixue heard it, they didn't even dare to shoot with live ammunition, so they basically guessed how serious the air leak problem was...

The air leakage problem of breech-loading rifles has always been a difficult problem to solve. In fact, Luo Zhixue did not expect to finally solve it by providing machining accuracy and other means.

In fact, it is difficult to solve the problem of air leakage by the gun itself, because no matter what the locking mechanism is, it is a moving part. Since it is a moving part, there must be a gap... When the gun is fired, the gunpowder burns The high-temperature and high-pressure gas generated in the end will leak out along this gap.

Not to mention the current Great Chu Empire or the countries in the 21th century in history, even in the [-]st century, it is still difficult to completely solve the problem of air leakage when developing bullet-free bullets!

This is also the reason why there is no large-scale equipment in the 21st century for firearms that use bullets without bullets...the problem of air leakage cannot be solved!
In history, the real solution to the air leakage problem is actually to rely on the metal cartridge case to load the ammunition...

On New Year's Eve, rainy day wishes everyone a happy new year.

I wish everyone good health, good luck, and prosperity in the New Year!