Traveling through the sword to engage in military industry.

Chapter 187 The Faltering Start of the Automobile Industry

Ren Zhong is not sure whether tricycles can run on the grassland, but it is not important. He can just let the people who go to the grassland to investigate it later.

However, in the vast frontier area, it is impossible to fight the Japanese by relying on two legs without horses or cars. Ren Zhong is very clear about this. The grassland is endless and flat. Once discovered, two legs will not be able to outrun four legs.

Therefore, for the upcoming battle on the northern grasslands, Ren Zhong would not allow the main force of the border area to be so passive.

Even though the mechanization idea that Hu Zi mentioned still has some flaws, such as the repair of vehicle defects, fuel supply, driver replacement, etc., there are still many problems that need to be solved, but we just need to work hard to overcome and make up for them.

The pilot project naturally started with the 2th Security Regiment. After Ren Zhong waited for one Red Star Hercules tricycle after another to come out, in addition to transporting ore during the day, he also spent hours at night on the road near Haojiaping for the th Security Regiment to train drivers. Even if not all the members were drivers, Ren Zhong required that at least one-third of them must learn to drive this tricycle.

According to Ren Zhong's estimate, the next troops to be dispatched would have to include at least four main regiments, plus the 4rd Temporary Division and the two early regiments, in order to completely engulf the Japanese in Jiuyuan!

Therefore, it is very necessary to wait until the refinery starts operation, collect fuel and transport it to the front line of Ikh Ju League to stockpile a batch. When ready to attack, the convoy loaded with weapons, ammunition and core components needed for the new aluminum plant, steel plant and uranium plant will head north to carry out large-scale construction projects.

It is not necessary to fully mechanize all four main regiments. As long as one main regiment is mechanized, the combat effectiveness of the troops will be increased exponentially. Then, they can occupy the key points of the Japanese escape at lightning speed, cooperate with the main force to move north, steadily capture Jiuyuan, and occupy the Bayan Obo mining area.

For Ren Zhong, smelting and military technology are now beginning to blossom. The next step is to compete for resources and logistics. The Japanese in Shanxi are still very strong, and the main force of the Japanese in North China is still more than 200,000. Even if the Japanese in Shanxi are not strong enough, they will desperately support them. The main forces of Taihang and Taiyue are not as fast as the military industry in the border areas.

They were simply unable to withstand the three-dimensional attack from the sky and underground by the Japanese. Even though half of the Japanese fighter planes in the sky were scrapped, the three-dimensional attack was a bit weak.

However, the Kwantung Army had not yet been destroyed. Relying on the continuous supply of resources from the Northeast, the Japanese had no shortage of weapons and ammunition.

The production capacity of pig iron in Anshan of the puppet Manchukuo reached 1941 million tons in 118, and was expected to reach 1942 million tons in 130.9. Now Ren Zhong has worked hard for more than a year, almost two years, but his output is still not even a fraction of that of others. It is conceivable that the gap is so huge.

The strongest point of the main force of the Taihang Taiyue base is that they can produce several 107mm artillery guns a month. Now they can't even replicate the S41 mountain gun and G20 anti-aircraft machine gun. If they face the Kwantung Army with hundreds or thousands of 105mm and 150mm heavy artillery, they will have no chance of winning.

Although the recovery of Heyuan and Yangcun bases has provided the Taiyue base with a fairly stable light weapons and ammunition supply base, facing the main force of more than 107, these are still a drop in the bucket. At least it will take a long time for a main regiment to be equipped with a mm firearm, not to mention it is unrealistic to take over Jin in one fell swoop.

Even if you manage to take it by chance, you can't keep it.

This was due to strength. In the short term, Ren Zhong had no other options. He could only focus on the resources and the Japanese in the north. Relatively speaking, if the border area had not been under pressure from Guosu and could not withdraw its main force, it would have been easy to take down the Japanese main force of a cavalry group and several puppet army divisions in Jiuyuan. Otherwise, if the border area had not been under pressure from Guosu and could not withdraw its main force, it would have been easy to take down the two main brigades in the border area.

But Ren Zhong was not in a hurry. The road leading to Ikh Ju League still had more than 100 kilometers to be widened, and the number of Daliwang tricycles in his hands was far from enough. It would not be difficult to capture Jiuyuan Shi, but it would not be easy to defend it. He had to plan for a protracted war.

Therefore, for the border areas, it is better to throw themselves into the tide of vigorous construction.

At the beginning of May, the refinery was put into trial operation and large-scale refining began. The olefins that Ren Zhong had always been thinking about also began mass production, and the synthetic rubber production line began to operate. Although the daily output was only a few tons and a maximum of 5 tires could be produced per ton, this production capacity was several times higher than that of the Daliwang tricycle.

Soon after, the second 1.8L single-cylinder diesel engine was successfully developed, with a maximum output power of 35 horsepower. Ren Zhong got a hydraulic dump four-wheel tractor mining truck from the main world. It looked ugly and was called a four-wheeled tractor. However, its rated load capacity could reach 3 tons. The carriage was enlarged to 3 meters, and the vehicle was 4.2 meters long. The maximum climbing gradient reached 40 degrees and the speed was 45 kilometers per hour.

Compared with the Daliwang, this four-wheeler looks ugly, but it weighs 1.5 tons and supports self-unloading, making it more practical in mining. It uses a diesel engine and can be started easily even in an environment of minus ten degrees.

The main features are that it is simple, cheap, easy to produce, durable and has a wide range of uses!

This forced the newly established Red Star Automobile Factory to increase its production capacity again. The production process did not change much, and was still based on tractor technology, except that the three wheels were replaced by four wheels, and there were still two gears, low gear 30 kilometers/hour, high gear 45 kilometers/hour.

This quasi-vehicle, named Red Star Victory I, solved the problem of towing tools for heavy mining and the soon-to-be-completed 105mm howitzer.

At the same time, the carriage, which is three meters long and one meter eighty wide, also greatly improves the troop transport capacity. Without considering humanization and comfort, if you move closer, according to Hu Zi's standards, you can sit in four rows, and there will be no problem transporting 30 soldiers (two people sit in the front row).

As for the "high speed" of 45 kilometers, it may seem a bit touching, but you have to know that it is several times faster than running on foot, and the key is that it is more durable!

Ren Zhong will not be too ambitious and pursue those heavy-duty trucks that were only developed in the 1970s and 1980s. For him, it is not that he cannot afford heavy-duty trucks, but under the current production conditions, the production of heavy-duty trucks with all-round high basic technical requirements is really not cost-effective!
It's nothing like the tractors we have now, which can basically be produced directly after taking the design drawings and making some modifications, without requiring much technical content at all!
What's more, heavy trucks need better roads to support them, and there are no conditions to build gravel and soil-grade roads now.

It was this kind of vehicle. When the Dali King came out, Staff Officer Ye brought people to test drive it, and then took a car back to the capital of the border area.

Now that the Victory I model is out, it’s inevitable that we’ll be exploited!
The automobile industry, which has a heavy responsibility, began from such a starting point.

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(End of this chapter)