The Rise of Ming Dynasty 1646

Chapter 373 Technology of the Eighteenth Century

Zhu Linmei thought for a while, and told Zheng Chenggong: "The two [-]-ton warships will be renamed 'Fuzhou' and 'Jianchang'." This was the first one he led the Dragon Guards to take back from the Qing army. The state capital is quite commemorative.

"From now on, warships of the same size will be named after state capitals. Larger warships will be named after provinces.

"As for those sentinel boats and arsonist boats, they will be named with the names of Zhongliang from past dynasties." He pointed to the two nearest sentry boats, "For example, these two boats are called 'Changping Hou Weiqing' and 'Champion Hou Huo Qubing' 'alright."

"Yes." Zheng Chenggong nodded and wrote down, "This subordinate will reorganize the names of all the warships according to the command of the adults."

After completing the deployment of the navy, a thick stack of memorials and military reports was sent from Tianxing Mansion by a fast horse. It is obvious that the situation is quite tense recently.

Zhu Linmi didn't dare to stay in Mawei too much, so she rushed back to the palace that day, and only wrote a letter before leaving, ordering the express ship to send it to Macau and hand it over to the head of the Customs Department.

After he left, Zheng Chenggong asked his men to drive the two [-]-ton warships back to Mawei Port, and sent another person to contact Yongbeili Shipyard.

For the sake of confidentiality, there are still some important parts on the ship that have not been installed because they have to practice with the Frangji sailors before. They are all the eighteenth-century technology brought by Zhu Linmi.

Now that they are about to go north to fight, these finishing work must be completed quickly.

Just after dinner, the craftsmen of Yongbeili Shipyard arrived at the port with the spare parts of seven carriages, and immediately boarded the ship and started working.

Artillery is the focus of improvement.According to the installation process left by Zhu Linmi, the craftsmen first asked the sailors to remove the artillery from the gun position, and then fixed two iron rails under the gun window, and installed a set of pulleys above the gun window.

After doing this, they moved a new gun carriage and placed it on the track. The wheels of the gun carriage had protruding edges and fit on the track.

In addition, there are two ropes at the front end of the gun carriage, which are connected above the gun window through pulleys.A plumb weight weighing eighty or ninety catties was tied to each end of the rope.

This new gun mount can ensure that the gun always advances and retreats in a straight line when firing.When the recoil of the shot pushed the cannon into the hold, the gunners could easily move it back along the rails.

At the same time, when the cannon fires, the two heavy lead weights will be pulled up, and the recoil will be greatly offset.

In this way, with this new set of gun mounts, the recoil of the cannon is greatly reduced, the time between shots is shortened and the stability is better.

This set of equipment was almost standard equipment for warships after the mid-eighteenth century, but it definitely belongs to the top technology right now.

You should know that for the same artillery, your firing interval is shorter than that of the enemy, which means that the enemy will be hit first in at least the second round of shooting.In just a few seconds, it is very likely that the outcome will be decided.

In addition, due to the stability brought by the new gun mount, the adjustment work required by the gunners of Ming Dynasty will be reduced a lot when aiming, which further shortens the firing interval and improves the shooting accuracy at the same time.

After the sailors reinstalled the cannon on the new mount, the craftsman installed a lighter on the tenon that had been reserved near the fire door of the cannon.

The principle of this thing is basically the same as that of the flintlock gun machine, but the size is enlarged.In addition, because there is no need to worry about the weight, larger flints and springs can be installed, resulting in a fire rate of more than [-]%.

The lighter eliminates the time it takes for the fuze to burn, which increases the rate of fire, but most importantly, the gunner does not have to walk around the cabin with an open flame, greatly reducing the possibility of misfire or accidentally igniting the gunpowder.

As for the device for adjusting the elevation angle with the screw and the new sights that the Longwei Army artillery battalion had already used, they were all added to the navy's cannons.

In addition to the improvement of the artillery, the sails have also been adjusted a lot.

A triangular sail was added to the second spar reserved at the bow, and a triangular spar was added to the spar of the mizzen. These small changes can make the ship sail better in longitudinal winds.

A lot of foot-operated drainage devices have been added to the cabin. Although the principle is the same as that of a country waterwheel, it can double the drainage speed when used on a boat.

Two days later, another carriage brought over 800 flintlocks and tens of thousands of lead bullets.

Sailors equipped with these blunderbuss will climb up the mast when the enemy is in the gang fight, fix themselves with a rope, and then shoot the enemy from a high position, which can effectively deal with the gang fight.

In addition, these guns also endowed the navy with certain land combat capabilities, which will play an extremely critical role in the future.

……

Zhang Furui, head of the Guangdong Customs Department, received the secret order from the auxiliary government king, but after he read the letter, he didn't even have time for dinner, so he immediately asked his servants to prepare a car and rush to Macau Port.

"Boss Zhang, do you mean to buy a merchant ship?" Pereira, the new resident representative of Macau Flangji, looked at Zhang Furuidao, "I can help you go to the shipyard in Manila to order. If I come forward, the price must be very favorable."

Zhang Furui listened to the interpretation, but shook his head with a smile and said: "The price is not a problem. I want a ship that can be used immediately. It can be of any size. Of course, it is best to have an armed merchant ship that can be equipped with cannons."

Pereira frowned, "Boss Zhang, speaking of it, the Daming Maritime Merchant and our Frangji Merchant are in competition. Do you want so many ships because you want to grab business..."

"It's about robbing business," Zhang Furui has already obtained the consent of the assistant king, and he can tell Fu Langji about some things, "but it's not with you, but," he said with a glance at Dongmian, "Helan people .”

"Oh?" Pereira smiled slyly, "As far as I know, the east coast of Daming has been blocked by the Helan Fleet, and no merchant ship can sail beyond a hundred nautical miles."

"If I tell you, the Daming Navy already has four large warships, oh, not our usual Fuchuan or Cantonese ships, but standard Galen ships. Each is equipped with 22 to 34 cannons, and one even has Double deck, able to carry eighteen-pound guns."

After Zhang Furui said this in one breath, he felt a little relieved, it took him a lot of effort to memorize this long passage on the road just now.

Pereira couldn't help squinting his eyes when he heard the words. The Eastern Empire has actually built four light cruiser-class warships, which will bring about a huge change in the balance of power in the Far East.You know, even the Helan Fleet entrenched in Dongfan only has two warships equipped with 28 artillery pieces, another three or four armed merchant ships have fourteen or five cannons, and the remaining dozen or so ships are all sixty or seventy ft. boat only.

He immediately understood that if Daming could have more than a dozen auxiliary small warships equipped with four to eight guns, he might be able to compete with the Helan people!
As for the merchant ships Mr. Zhang wants to buy, they only need to be simply modified and equipped with cannons, and they can immediately participate in the war.

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(End of this chapter)