The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 271 Artillery Range
The New Year has passed, but the capital is still freezing cold.

It's better in the city. The city walls and the densely packed houses block the cold wind, so it's not that cold.

It’s not so good outside the city. The howling cold wind blows across the snowy fields, and it’s as cold as a knife.

However, no matter how cold it is, we have to leave the city.

Early in the morning on the 16th day of the first lunar month, around noon, Wanli led tens of thousands of imperial guards out of Xi'an Gate on horseback and headed straight for Deshengmen in the north of the city.

At this moment, all the streets and alleys in the capital are paved with asphalt.

The people in the capital were also very hardworking. They got up early and cleared the snow in front of their doors.

The warhorse's iron hooves, wrapped in thick cloth, didn't make much noise as they stepped on the asphalt road.

The imperial guards also changed into the warmest winter clothes, and wrapped their faces with half-length hats, so they didn't feel the cold in the city.

Wanli also wore the new military uniform of the imperial guards.

This military uniform is really good at keeping out the cold. It is covered with fur from head to toe, and the cold wind seems unable to blow in at all.

However, after leaving Deshengmen, he couldn't help shivering when the biting cold wind blew.

There is no way. No matter how good the military uniform is, it is not airtight, and the biting cold wind can still get in through the gaps.

The reason why he had to leave the city in such freezing weather was because the navy's naval gun samples had been completed.

At this time, ten thousand-ton giant ships have been built in Nanzhili, but they cannot be brought here because the northern section of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal is frozen.

He will have to build a large number of giant ships in the future, so this naval gun must be built quickly.

Last year, he wasted more than half a year in order to make money from oil refining, so Yongnianbo Wang Wei had to work overtime with his craftsmen to make naval gun samples during the Spring Festival.

No matter what, naval guns must be mass-produced this year. Otherwise, having a huge ship without naval guns will be useless.

He pondered for a while, and then he arrived at the south bank of the Wenyu River.

At this moment, the water wheels on both sides of the Wenyu River had been built long ago and were still turning.

The giant disc, which was so densely packed that you couldn't see the end of it at a glance, looked truly spectacular.

The Ming Dynasty is really about to become a country of waterwheels.

There are now thousands of water wheels around the capital, and hundreds have been built in Nanjing.

Hydraulic power is really a good power source. Not only is it inexhaustible, but most importantly, it is very stable.

If he could promote water wheels to the two capitals and thirteen provinces of the Ming Dynasty, the productivity of the Ming Dynasty would definitely increase rapidly.

However, this will lead to another problem. If productivity increases rapidly but the amount of gold, silver, copper and other currencies on the market does not increase rapidly, it will cause deflation.

If the Ming Dynasty had not yet developed large-scale maritime trade, the rapid increase in productivity would have caused problems.

At this time, naval guns are even more important and must be built quickly.

He pondered all the way, and the south side of the Summer Resort was already in sight.

Yongnian Earl Wang Wei and his family were waiting there with a group of officers from the Shenji Camp and foremen.

Wanli did not dismount. After the emperor and his ministers exchanged greetings, he waved his hand and said, "Hurry up and take me to see what's going on outside. It's too cold."

They felt much better after they entered the walls of the Summer Resort.

At this time, the road leading to the Miyun Palace on the south side of the Summer Resort had already been repaired, and the craftsmen had cleared the snow on it, so they had no problem riding their horses at full speed.

In less than a quarter of an hour, tens of thousands of people arrived at the huge North Arena.

At this time, a large shed had been set up in the North Arena. There were many soldiers from the Shenjiying Camp in the shed, and the naval gun samples should be there.

Wanli rode his horse over to take a look, and sure enough, there was a cannon in the shed.

Moreover, the artillery was not mounted on a gun carriage, but on a fixed gun mount.

How should I put it, this cannon doesn't seem to be much bigger than a cannon weighing a hundred pounds or so.

Wanli took a closer look, then took the telescope and scanned the ship model built with ship planks two or three miles away. Then he ordered: "Fire a shot and see."

The soldiers of the Shenjiying Camp immediately and swiftly opened the gun door, picked up the shells and stuffed them in, then closed the gun door, took out their lighters, and lit the fuse.

With a "boom", the shells quickly landed on the ship model.

The shell went straight through the model and hit inside, leaving a hole roughly the size of a bowl on the plate.

The penetrating power of this conical shell is indeed much stronger than that of a spherical shell.

When he was improving the artillery shells, a general had suggested that round shells would be more lethal when rolled, while conical shells could only hit one enemy at a time.

This makes sense.

However, they did not have many opportunities to use artillery during land battles.

Because their main opponents in land warfare were the Northern Tartar cavalry, and these days artillery had no explosive damage, and the angle adjustment was very slow, and the range was not far, so they could only fire a few rounds at most before the enemy rushed towards them.

In this case, whether you kill one enemy or kill or injure several doesn't really make much difference. However, the situation is different when a conical shell is used in naval battles.

The main target of artillery in naval battles is not the enemy, but the enemy's ships. As long as the enemy's ships can be sunk, the result will be the same no matter how many people are on the ships.

In this case, conical shells are much more powerful than round shells.

Now the diameter of their shells is only slightly larger than a fist. If it is a round shell, it will most likely be bounced away when it hits the ship's plank that is more than an inch thick. However, the pointed cone-shaped shell will penetrate the ship's plank with a click.

However, this power seems to be a little insufficient.

Because their ship planks are made of pine wood.

Pine wood is light and tough, so it is suitable for making ship planks, but pine wood has poor strength.

If the enemy uses stronger teak, then a shell slightly thicker than a fist may not be able to penetrate it.

If the enemy uses ironwood, which is incredibly strong, then shells slightly thicker than a fist will not be able to penetrate it at all.

There's also the issue of range.

The range of this two-hundred-pound artillery piece seems to be not much longer than that of a one-hundred-pound artillery piece.

What is going on here?
Wanli thought for a moment, then asked, "Father-in-law, how long is the barrel of this naval gun, and how big is the shell?"

Yongnian Earl Wang Wei said without hesitation: "The barrel of the naval gun is two feet long, and the shell is three inches thick."

Wanli then asked, "How long is the barrel of the horse-drawn cannon, which weighs over a hundred pounds, and how big is the shell?"

Yongnianbo Wang Wei said without hesitation: "The barrel of that kind of artillery is one and a half feet long, and the shell is two and a half inches thick."

Sure enough, the ratio of the barrel length to the caliber of one gun is nearly seven times, and the other is exactly six times.

The range of this smoothbore gun seems to depend mainly on the ratio of the barrel length to the barrel caliber. The larger the ratio, the farther it can theoretically shoot.

Another factor is the amount of gunpowder loaded. The more gunpowder loaded, the farther it can shoot.

The difference in caliber between the barrels of naval guns and horse-drawn artillery is actually not that big, that is, the shells of naval guns can be thicker and can hold more gunpowder, so the range is about half a mile longer than that of horse-drawn artillery.

This range is far from enough, less than three miles, you must be kidding.

Now those colonial bandits in Europe seem to have even built cannons, and that thing has a range of at least five or six miles.

There is a famous saying in later generations that truth is only within the range of shooting.

This is not a joke, it's true.

Therefore, the artillery range must exceed that of the enemy.

Question: How to explain this?
It seems that there are no mortars and cannons in the Ming Dynasty at present.

What they made was a mortar.

These days, guns with a barrel caliber ratio of less than fifteen times seem to be mortars, and guns with a barrel caliber ratio of more than fifteen times are considered cannons.

Wanli thought about it carefully, then asked, "Father-in-law, can't the barrel of this gun be made longer?"

Uh, this.

Yongnian Earl Wang Wei slowly shook his head and said, "Your Majesty, I'm afraid we can't rashly lengthen this, because if we lengthen the barrel, it will become thinner, and there is a risk of explosion."

Then add weight.

The current ratio of barrel length to caliber is nearly seven times. If it is more than doubled, the barrel caliber ratio will exceed fifteen times.

Wanli pondered, "Then let's make a 500-jin cannon. The barrel will remain the same thickness, but we'll make it five feet long, the shell casing longer, and we'll put more gunpowder in it."

what?
Isn't this artillery heavy enough?

Yongnianbo Wang Wei said carefully: "Your Majesty, it is very difficult to process a naval gun weighing more than 200 kilograms now. I am afraid that it will be impossible to process a gun weighing more than 500 kilograms.

In the past, cannons weighing over 300 to 400 kilograms were cast, the inner wall of the barrel was hand-polished, and then the lead holes were drilled and directly pulled onto the city wall. There was no way to do fine processing at all.

Unable to process finely?

Wanli couldn't help but wonder, "Why?"

Yongnian Earl Wang Wei explained in detail, "Because it's too heavy, a gun barrel weighing over 200 kilograms would require four strong craftsmen to carry. A gun barrel weighing over 500 kilograms might not even be able to be lifted by ten strong craftsmen."

You still need people to carry it?
Wanli was puzzled and asked, "Don't you have a hoist? Can't you lift a waterwheel frame weighing thousands or even tens of thousands of pounds?"

That thing can't be used everywhere.

Yongnianbo Wang Wei said helplessly: "Your Majesty, there are many steps in processing the gun barrel, so we can't use a hanging gourd."

Is there such a thing?
Wanli thought for a moment, then waved his hand and said, "Come on, take me to see how the gun barrel is made."

He has seen the processing of artillery barrels weighing over 100 kilograms.

However, that has no reference value, because two craftsmen can lift a cannon barrel weighing over 100 kilograms.

(End of this chapter)