The Rise of Ming Dynasty 1646

Chapter 281 Galen Warship
"Your Majesty pays homage to Your Highness.

"Your Highness, the material has been found."

Zhu Linmi was instructing the craftsmen to install the winch of the gantry crane, when she saw Pang Zhu trot over, remembering that there is no need to kneel down in the shipyard, she bowed her hands and said anxiously: "Anping Chengji Shipyard has more than 30 pieces of various kinds of anise, small There are more than [-] materials, all of which have been dried in the shade. The lower officials sent people to contact the shipyard pretending to build a private ship, and the owner of Cheng Ji even boasted, "If necessary, [-] large materials can be transferred within ten days.'"

The "big material" he refers to is the wood that can be used to make ship keels and girders, usually five to ten feet long, and even more than fifteen feet long.The small material is wood such as shipbuilding ribs and ship planks. Although the size of the wood is not high, the amount of use is very large.

Zhu Linming was overjoyed that the upgrading work of the shipyard would be finished soon, and she was waiting for the timber to be put on the berth.

He was about to order to buy all these ship materials, but he heard Pang Zhu continue: "It's just that Mrs. Cheng heard that he wanted to buy ship materials, but the lion opened his mouth and asked for more than twice the usual price..."

Zhu Linmi frowned, explaining that she was indeed a profiteer, and asked Pang Zhu, "How much silver do I need to buy these timbers?"

"Cheng's asking price is based on beech wood. The length is three feet, and the circumference is less than five feet, and the price is ten taels per foot. The length is three to ten feet, and each foot is 12 taels. The circumference is more than five feet, and the price is two cents for each additional foot. .

"According to the calculation, the 300 pieces of large materials cost 16 taels in total. The price of the small beech wood materials is less than half of the price of the large materials, and the price of the small fir wood materials is [-]% lower.

Zhu Linmi frowned even more upon hearing this.With 17 small materials and 5 large materials, you can probably build four [-]-ton Galen ships, and the wood will cost [-] taels.In addition to labor costs, sails, ropes and other expenses, a boat may not be able to get off the berth without [-] taels.

This is only the cost of the ship itself. Although the cannons on the ship can be made by the Ordnance Bureau, the number of cannons on the Galen ship is extremely large. It is estimated that each ship will have to invest tens of thousands of taels of cannon.

A total of 6 tons of warships will cost more than [-] taels.The navy is indeed not for the poor.

He breathed a sigh of relief and told Pang Zhu, "Try to bargain with him, if you really can't, buy it first."

A few days ago, the Ministry of Industry sent people to the mountains to log, but it took time for the wood to dry.And Daming urgently needed a powerful navy, and it really couldn't be delayed any longer, so he had to buy this batch of wood first.

"Officer, follow orders."

Not long after Pang Zhu walked, two people dressed as craftsmen followed closely.Zhu Linming knew that it was the Jin Yiwei sent by Zheng Guangying to the shipyard to secretly monitor whether officials were corrupt in such large transactions.

It's not that he doesn't trust Pang Zhu, it's that the officials in the late Ming Dynasty were corrupt and had to guard against it.

Now that the timber was available, Zhu Linmi immediately summoned more than a dozen leading craftsmen and began to arrange specific shipbuilding matters.

When it was getting dark, in the drawing room of the shipyard, Zhu Linmi took the meeting minutes from the clerk and read them again, and concluded: "Then it's settled.

"Two small ship berths simultaneously build two Galen warships of [-] stone. The big ship berth builds a large ship of [-] stone."

Since the craftsmen were still very unaccustomed to the unit of "ton", he had to use "stone" to express the displacement. The former is 260 tons, and the latter is more than 500 tons.

This big boat is actually an improved blessing boat specially used for naval warfare. It was first invented by Zheng Zhilong and belongs to the main battleship of the Daming Navy.The word "熕" in its name comes from the heavy cannon mounted on the bow.

To be honest, Zhu Linmi didn't really want to use the blessing ship for naval battles.

Due to inherent structural limitations, the combat effectiveness of Daming's Fuchuan is much lower than that of European-style Galen ships of the same size.

First of all, Fuchuan's hull has a "V" shape in cross-section. Although it can effectively reduce seawater resistance and is good for resisting wind and waves, its lateral stability is insufficient.If the cannon on the deck fires at the side of the ship, it may cause the hull to shake in the slightest, and the hull may capsize in severe cases.

Galen ships have been improved from the beginning for naval battles that use artillery in large quantities. The hull section is "U"-shaped, with a wide bottom and good longitudinal stability, which can withstand sideways shooting from large-caliber artillery.

Yifu boats usually only install large-caliber guns at the bow and stern, and only fire forward and backward.Only small-caliber guns can be placed on the deck, usually the weaker Francois machine guns.

Galen ships, on the other hand, can arrange a large number of heavy artillery side by side on the deck. When engaging in battle, they will face the enemy from the side. A dozen or even dozens of cannons will fire in salvo. The firepower density is several orders of magnitude higher than that of Fuchuan.

In addition to the shape of the ship and the internal structure of the hull, Fuchuan also has shortcomings as a warship.

Fuchuan's interior is a watertight cabin structure, with a large number of partitions dividing the hull into more than ten sections, and any leak in any section will not affect other sections.Therefore, Fuchuan has excellent anti-sinkability, and it will not sink even if it touches a reef that is not very large.

However, the structure of the watertight cabin has brought problems. For example, it will cause the center of gravity of the whole ship to move up. Combined with the "V"-shaped hull, it is not conducive to the stability when firing on the deck.

In addition, the bulkhead occupies the space in the ship, making it impossible to lay a multi-layer through deck inside the hull.

The craftsmen of the Ming Dynasty called the Galen ship a plywood ship, because Galen used a rib structure, which gave up the anti-sinkability, and only supported the hull with ribs fixed on the keel, so the interior space of the hull was huge.Therefore, one or even two decks can be laid in the hull for placing artillery.

In Western pirate movies, you can often see many "windows" on the side of the sailing ship, and then countless artillery poke their heads out of the windows and shoot at the enemy ships on the side of the ship.This is the cannon arranged on the second deck inside the Galen ship.

The position of the second deck is low, resulting in a low center of gravity, and the guns placed on it have less impact on the stability of the hull when firing, so it is possible to use heavier guns than the main deck.

Combining these factors, in terms of the number of heavy artillery alone, Galen can be nearly ten times higher than Fuchuan!
As for the larger Galen ship, it can even have three decks, and the amount of guns it can carry is even more astonishing.

Just like the "Sovereign of the Sea", which has been in service in the UK for nine years, is of this design. The whole ship is equipped with hundreds of cannons, of which there are about 32 24-pound cannons and [-]-pound cannons each.

The cannons carried by a ship are enough to equip one hundred thousand troops, and the firepower is terrifying!
In addition to the difference in the number of cannons carried, the Galen ship gave up the watertight cabin, resulting in a significant reduction in the overall weight of the hull, so the hull can be made very thick.

Just like the [-]-ton Fuchuan, the hull usually uses ten centimeters thick planks, while Galen is often more than twenty centimeters, and the heavy warship even has a half meter thick hull!
(End of this chapter)