I am Da Song

Chapter 197 Cold Forging Armor and Blast Furnace Steelmaking
"Cold-forged armor?" Zhao Huan asked, "Is it the armor that the Privy Council said before, that it is indestructible, shining through the light, and can learn from hair?"

Su Xi replied: "It is this kind of armor that the official family has learned from."

"I am used to using the hot forging method, because the hot forging process is easier to mass-produce, but because this process is too advanced, I cannot fully control the craftsman, so the material is brittle and easy to break."

"Cold forging is different. This process is relatively simple. There is no need to use furnace fire and high temperature forging, but only cold forging. The iron sheet is cut into modules and hammered continuously until the thickness of the iron sheet is reduced by two-thirds compared to the original. , even if it is forged."

"Although this craft is simple, it is time-consuming and labor-intensive. A blacksmith can't produce many iron pieces even if he jingles for a day, so it can't meet the needs of millions of forbidden troops."

"After the northern and southern workshops set up the rotary machines, machines were used instead of manpower, and the cold forging armor was finally no longer limited by the shortage of quantity."

Zhao Huan nodded, sometimes the more advanced the technology, the more suitable it is.Technology that is too ahead of the times, because craftsmen cannot fully control it, but cannot provide high-quality products.

"The hot forging method is the way out for me in the Song Dynasty. Regarding how to solve the brittleness and softness of the iron sheet, I have an idea. Set up a blast furnace to make steel and further increase the temperature."

All the defects are due to insufficient firepower!
After the firepower is increased, all kinds of problems will be easily solved.

Raise the temperature of the furnace to 2000 degrees, and all impurities will be blown away for you.

The combination of blast furnace steelmaking and powerful forging technology is the pinnacle of armor.

However, for Da Song, the use of plate armor is relatively limited.

The most embarrassing thing about plate armor is that when he can be researched, the powerful smelting process will definitely be able to research the musket.

In the face of the powerful firepower of the infantry, the expensive plate cavalry is completely worthless for his cost.

"Blast furnace steelmaking?" Su Xinian said, "I have made a note of it, and there are already some clues."

Zhao Huan nodded in relief. Regarding raising the temperature in the furnace, Zhongyuan is not clueless and helpless.In fact, craftsmen now use clay to increase the temperature in the furnace. As long as they are given directions and let them try their best to increase the temperature in the furnace, improvements will be made soon.

Which future generations will not know the term blast furnace steelmaking?
This is the basic condition of industrial mass production.

Before the second industrial revolution, all technologies did not have a large span, but only a little bit of progress on the original basis.

For example, the mechanical textile machine of the first industrial revolution, that thing is similar everywhere in the Song Dynasty, there are large spinning wheels, and there are also large water-turning spinning wheels, which can spin more than one hundred catties a day and night.According to this production capacity, Da Song no longer deliberately suppresses industry and commerce, and the city's commodity economy will explode in an instant.

Compared with industrial production, Yue Fei still paid more attention to the condition of the armor, and asked, "What is the specific protective effect of this cold-forged armor?"

Su Xi replied confidently: "I once recorded this kind of armor in the "Mengxi Bi Tan" by the scholar Shen Chao. It was fifty steps away and shot with a crossbow, but it couldn't get in. Now there are rotary cutting iron ingots, and mechanical forging armor. The quality of the armor pieces and armor pieces is excellent, and has fully replicated the effect of the iron armor."

Yue Fei was full of joy and asked, "Can't you enter with a strong crossbow at fifty steps?"

Su Xi said with certainty: "A strong crossbow can't penetrate at fifty steps. Now that it's improved, it's hard to penetrate even with a god-armed bow at fifty steps."

Yue Fei looked excited and said to Zhao Huan: "The Jin army is fighting, and it only shoots arrows when it reaches fifty paces. Now it is difficult to shoot through the bow within fifty paces, and the bows of the Jin army may not be able to hurt my soldiers at all."

Thinking of the tens of thousands of heavy infantry of the Song Army wearing cold forged armor arrayed like a mountain, the Jin Army's bows and arrows were all ineffective, and they had to face the steel phalanx with flesh and blood.

Everyone was trembling with excitement, and one could feel Jin Jun's despair just by imagining it.

The tens of thousands of the Song army, who were shining in the sun, all relied on their swords to chop, and the soldiers of the Jin army who chopped them collapsed from exhaustion, and the Song army would not suffer much loss.

Even if the Song army collapsed with [-]% casualties, the Jin army was exhausted before defeating the Song army.

And once the Song army did not retreat, the casualties were more than 30.00% and the array was still in order. The Jin army could desperately lose the courage to continue attacking just by seeing this steel phalanx.Shaking this kind of steel wall with flesh and blood, no matter how you look at it, it will be bloody and dead.

Yue Fei asked with concern: "How is the output of this kind of cold forged armor?"

Su Xi said with a smile: "The North and South workshops have set up more than [-] sets of rotary machines, and set up hundreds of chain-type transmission lines to produce continuously day and night. Now there are more than [-] sets of armor."

The chain drive, which is the most classic equipment on the assembly line, was invented by Zhang Sixun, a famous scientist in the Song Dynasty, before the tenth century. It is more than 800 years ahead of the West and has a history of nearly 1000 years!
Now representing the highest level of Song Dynasty's science and technology, the military inspector has used all these advanced production technologies, and suddenly exploded with unparalleled production capacity.

Eighteen thousand sets of heavy armor.Others were trembling with excitement, while Ji Xiang Yang was twitching in distress.

Asked: "How much does a set of this armor cost?"

Su Xi replied: "Be considerate and reassuring. With mechanical production, the price of armor is greatly reduced. In my dynasty, it cost 3 to make a pair of infantry armor, but only [-] taels to make a set of cold-forged armor." A thousand dollars."

Each pair of armor saves six guan, which is a lot.After all, the most expensive thing in this era is transportation. It will not be cheap to mine a large amount of iron ore and send it to Tokyo for thousands of miles.

57 sets of armor are worth 8000 guan. This figure is completely insignificant compared to the [-] million guan military expenditure of the Song Dynasty.

As long as we can win the war, cut off the military pressure in the north, and resume production in Hebei, even 570 million guan is worth it.

Or to take it a step further, if it can solve the northern border troubles for the Song Dynasty, even if it is 700 million yuan in military expenditures, the Song Dynasty will not hesitate.In order to confront the strong enemy in the north, the Song Dynasty has spent huge military expenditures year after year, which has become an overwhelming pressure on the court.

In the first half of this year, Zhao Huan has confiscated more than 2000 million taels of silver, confiscated more than 2000 million taels of silver, and lost tens of millions of taels of land sales. The war has no end in sight.

How many 2000 million taels of silver can Da Song throw into this endless abyss every year?
Zhao Huan said to Yue Fei: "These 8000 sets of cold-forged armor are all for the Shenwu Youjun. I want the Shenwu Youjun to reach the peak of this era in this battle."

In this decisive battle, Zhao Huan did not give Yue Fei any epoch-making advanced weapons, such as cast copper cannons.

Because the research on firearms is still unstable, no one can grasp how big the results can be.

On the contrary, Zhao Huan rebuilt this army that crossed the ages into the pinnacle of the cold weapon era!The purpose is to maximize the probability of victory in the war.

This may be the last time the main force of the Song Army will face a decisive battle with a cold weapon.

After the end of the Northern Expedition, the Song army will gradually leapfrog the era and leave the surrounding barbarians far behind.

Of course, auxiliary thermal weapons such as palm mines and vans, which have been proven feasible, will still be distributed to the army with all their strength.

(End of this chapter)