The next day, Zhu Hongsan got up early because he was going to find Tieniu to study and produce weapons together. After breakfast with several wives, Zhu Hongsan went out.

When I arrived at the production workshop, I saw Tieniu and a few people arrived early. Everyone stood up when they saw Zhu Hongsan coming and said, "The boss is here."

Zhu Hongsan nodded and Tie Niu said, "These are the best blacksmith masters of mine. There are several grandfathers who have made firearms before. Brother can ask them first."

Zhu Hongsan said: "Do you all know how to do a gun barrel?"

A middle-aged blacksmith stood up and said, "Boss, my grandfather used to be a craftsman in the firearms camp in the capital, and he made three-eyed guns."

Zhu Hongsan said, "Okay, let me tell you."

The blacksmith said, "The most difficult thing about a musket is the production of a gun barrel. You must first make the cast iron into iron sheets, then roll it up, and then reinforce the walls with iron bars. It will take a month for a skilled craftsman to make a musket."

Zhu Hongsan asked: "Can't we drill holes with iron rods and directly process them into muskets?"

The blacksmith said, "Someone has done that. When I was a child, I heard my grandfather say that. There are a few skilled craftsmen in their camp who can process iron rods, but it takes a lot of time and cannot be made in less than two or three months. My grandfather hasn't learned it."

Zhu Hongsan nodded, thinking that it seemed that muskets were still troublesome. It was okay to produce one or two on a small scale, but it was not enough to produce a large scale. If not, get the artillery first.

Zhu Hongsan said to everyone: "Who can make red cannons?"

A young man stood up next to him and whispered: "Boss, my family is in Shaanxi. My father and I used to be craftsmen from Yulinwei, Shaanxi. My grandfather used to make red cannons. When I was a child, I heard my father say it, but I never did it."

Zhu Hongsan didn't expect that he could find such a talent and asked, "What's your name for young man?"

The young man said, "My surname is Li, and my name is Li Er."

Zhu Hongsan said, "Li Er is so ugly. I'll give you a name. From now on, you will be called Li Quanzhong."

Li Quanzhong knelt down and said, "Thank you for giving the name to the head."

Zhu Hongsan said, "Get up, be a master. Let's take action to see if you can get one."

After saying that, he started to do it.

Li Quanzhong's method is the traditional Chinese clay method. The method is very simple. First, use a fine sieve to make white clay, remove gravels and debris. Then beat the evenly blended mud into flat clay pieces, wait for the clay pieces to half dry, and then make several large pieces of clay desert according to the shape of the cast cannon, and then dry it, or bake it on a light fire, trim and fix the defects on the inner surface of the clay, so as to be as smooth as possible, which becomes the external clay used for casting.

Then use the same process to make the inner range, and the outer range is divided into several parts, and the inner range is a whole. However, it is smaller than the outer range, and the size that is different from the outer range is the thickness of the cannon. It is also true that when the inside and outside are all dry, put the inner range inverted on the base, and then place the outer range around the inner range. After the outer range is closed, seal the outer range with mud. After the mud is dry, cover the closed range cover with at least one pouring hole on the cover.

Then cast it, inject the melted iron solution along the pouring hole, wait for the iron to cool down, break the outer and inner surfaces, take out the cast artillery, and then polish and trim it. This is the production process of the Red Cannon.

Don’t think that this craft is simple. This is the crystallization of the wisdom of the working people in ancient China. It was no less than the artillery craft in the late Ming Dynasty.

Zhu Hongsan was very dissatisfied with the red cannons he made. Why? Judging from the people who have been educated by Zhu Hongsan in a systematic and modern way, this kind of red cannon has several fatal shortcomings.

The first point is too heavy. Since China lacks copper, pig iron is used as raw material. Pig iron is not as ductile as bronze, and the process inevitably forms sand holes. In order to prevent the blowout, domestic cannons are made very heavy, so there is a saying that they are thousands of kilograms of cannons.

The second point is that there is little charge, short range, no sight, and no aiming. The outer mouth of the cannon's barrel is wide and the inside is small. It cannot effectively gather gunpowder gas. The inside of the cannon is not qualified round, and the barrel is not bored. The craftsmen of the mud model do whatever they want and have not formed standardization. The logistics maintenance in the future is too troublesome. There is no problem with this. This is a design problem. Next time, Zhu Hongsan designs it as small as a mouth and a big belly, which is easy to solve.

The third point is the most fatal, the manufacturing time is too long. It took me two months to get this one, but I just need to get it for almost two months. What I lack the most is time.

The shells were easy to get started, just cast a few solid iron balls with cast iron. While waiting for the mud sheet to dry out, Zhu Hongsan ordered people to make 100 shells.

Let’s not talk about the others, let’s try this red cannon first. Zhu Hongsan asked Zhu Hongyi to call his guard company, found a few horses, and pulled the cannon to the playground. At the same time, he asked someone to notify the two brothers of the Ma family and Tong Yangjia to come and have a look.

The soldiers training on the playground saw the commander pulling a cannon and stopped to watch the fun. Qian Yong came over and said, "Sir, everyone wants to see it."

Zhu Hongsan said: "Okay, let the team come out and line up next to you. All you battalion commanders come to see." Qian Yong went down excitedly to gather the troops.

Zhu Hongsan ordered four mounds of soil to be set up in three hundred steps, five hundred steps, eight hundred steps, and one thousand steps. Then he asked someone to take out hundreds of kilograms of gunpowder.

While preparing, Ma Jiyuan, Ma Mingyuan, and Tong Yangjia were here. The baby daughter Zhu Luo also came to see the fun.

Ma Mingyuan looked at the cannons in the middle and said, "How can the lord actually make red cannons? I think this is not much smaller than the one on the top of Beijing city."

Zhu Hongsan said, "This is just a test model, and it needs to be improved." After saying that, he saw Zhu Luo, Zhu Hongsan said, "Daughter will go home first, tell your mother and second mother that you will set off fireworks later, so that they will be careful and don't scare my son." Zhu Luo ran back to inform him, but he didn't expect that Ma Xiaofang was also a person who likes to watch the fun, and actually led Ma Ruyan and the Dong sisters out to see it. This scared Zhu Hongsan. This was the test model. What if it exploded? He hurriedly went and persuaded the ladies to return to their yard to see.

After everything was arranged, Zhu Hongsan asked everyone to withdraw from 500 meters to a safe position. He took a few soldiers with him, first loaded two kilograms of gunpowder, then picked up a projectile weighing about three kilograms and put it into the barrel chamber. Then he aimed and left a long fuse rope. After looking back, Zhu Hongsan left a soldier and ran to a safe position.

Zhu Hongsan signaled the soldier to light the fire. After the soldier lit the fire, he immediately ran back. After running two hundred meters, the cannon roared. A burst of smoke was angry. People in the distance saw a black dot coming out of the muzzle and landing on the edge of the 500-step mound.

Everyone felt good for a while before they realized that Zhu Luo was so scared that he couldn't even close his mouth and said, "Good, it's so loud."

Zhu Hongsan said to everyone: "Let's go, let's see how the effect is?"

Everyone came to the bounce point, and there was a pit ten centimeters deep on the ground. Since this was the playground, the ground was trampled by soldiers and the shells were shot into ejection. The shells were found twenty meters ahead of the bounce point. There was blue smoke on the ground. If this was a practical battle, all the things, people and animals in the twenty meters would be killed.

Ma Jiyuan and Ma Mingyuan looked in surprise. Ma Jiyuan thought, "I have heard of the reputation of the Red Barbarian Cannon in Liaodong, but I didn't expect it to be so powerful. If there were hundreds of gates bombing, there would be living people on the opposite side."

Ma Mingyuan said: "Congratulations to the Lord for making such a powerful tool."

Tong Yangjia said, "Lord, why do we go to Guangdong to do with such a powerful weapon? Build three or four hundred gates here, and then you will kill him if you come."

Zhu Hongsan cursed: "Do you think this red cannon is made of mud? The Ming Dynasty only had twenty-four gates in the country, and they were all in the capital and Liaodong. It took us two months to get it done if we were not as powerful and ranged as the court. The court weighed ten thousand pounds, and the range of three miles could not be made every two years."

At this time, the six battalion commanders next to him realized that they couldn't fight in order to get the cannon. Zhu Hongsan was so angry that he cursed: "What are he doing? No one is there in his mother's fight. We made this ourselves, and we can get as much equipment as we want in the future."

The six battalion commanders stopped after hearing Zhu Hongsan say that everyone has a share.

Zhu Hongsan said to Ma Mingyuan: "Sir, don't be happy too early. This cannon is only experimental and there are still many problems that have not been solved. It's already November, and there are still half a year left, so at most a few can be built."

Ma Mingyuan nodded and said, "Yes, if there are only a few, it is useless, but we can make it on a large scale in Guangdong."

Zhu Hongsan said: "Let's talk about it then. I will improve this cannon in the next few months. I will bother with all the preparations at home."

Erma and Tong Yangjia said they didn't dare to act, and then the four of them chatted for a while and went to work hard.

Zhu Hongsan called Tie Niu and said, "Tie Niu, find a few people and try how many shots this cannon can fire. Be careful of the danger. After each launch, you must check the cannon body. Don't use it if there are cracks." Tie Niu nodded and arranged for people not to raise it.

Zhu Hongsan knew that this cannon could hit nearly 400 meters, which was the power of a new type of gunpowder. According to the standards of the court, this one should not be considered an artillery, but a large musket. Because it weighs only 500 kilograms, it is only heavier than some large guns. Zhu Hongsan was still not satisfied with this. It seems that he would continue to improve tomorrow. In his mind, the ideal cannon should weigh 500 kilograms, with a range of three to five miles, and two horses can be pulled by, so that the power can be guaranteed while ensuring mobility.

Seeing that his wives were still waiting for him, Zhu Hongsan thought that he should go home for a month of fatigue. After that, he pulled Zhu Luo, who was squatting while looking at the shells, back home.

When he walked to the door and saw four wives coming out to greet him, Ma Xiaofang was most happy. Because since he and Zhu Hongsan got married, he heard others say that Zhu Hongsan was ungrateful and cruel. This time, his husband finally didn't need to kill and set fire to prove that he was better than others. As a good wife, Ma Xiaofang was naturally happy.

Zhu Hongsan saw Ma Xiaofang, who was erect for eight months, and said, "What else is the wife doing? Come into the house quickly, it's too cold outside."

Ma Xiaofang smiled and said, "Don't worry, Master, I'm not cold at all. I'm very happy to see Master's success."

Zhu Hongsan smiled and led the ladies back to the room without mentioning it.

When they were having sex at night, the Dong sisters said, "Master, we sisters can't serve the master in the future."

"Oh? What's wrong with you? I'm having a period of time?"

"Hate, my sister and I are pregnant."
Chapter completed!