The arrogance started from Chinatown

Chapter 790 The Spaniards are very brave!
In the early morning, Cicely opened the window and a fresh breeze blew in, bringing with it the sounds of various birds.

The sunlight filled the room, putting Cicely in a very good mood.

The summer in Los Angeles is too hot, and the temperature only dropped a little at the end of October.

The temperature is generally around 26 degrees during the day and around 17 degrees at night.

The air is freshest in the early morning.

Then the next second a goose down pillow flew over from the bed and hit Cicely's face.

"You're pulling the curtains so early in the morning? Are you sick?" Chen Zhengwei scolded angrily.

Cicely smiled helplessly, closed the curtains again, tiptoed out of the room to make coffee... and asked the maid to make coffee.

Cicely had never cooked since she was a child.

At around ten o'clock in the morning, Chen Zhengwei got up from bed, went downstairs in his pajamas, smoked a cigar, and saw Cicely painting in the yard through the window.

Almost all wealthy girls of this era attended art schools, and Cicely was no exception.

Although her paintings are a bit ordinary, they can be a way to kill time, especially when Chen Zhengwei is not around. She has been obsessed with them recently.

Near noon, two carriages entered the manor.

Brother Donahue got off the carriage and greeted Cicely respectfully: "Good afternoon, Mrs. Chen!"

Cicely nodded at them with a smile on her face.

The Donahue brothers were then taken into the living room of the manor.

"Boss! Your life is really enviable. The weather in Los Angeles is much better than that in San Francisco..." The Donahue brothers first exchanged greetings and then took out the drawings from their briefcases.

"Boss, here are the blueprints!"

"Tell me more details!" Chen Zhengwei said as he took the drawing and looked at it.

"This is an armored cruiser designed according to your requirements. It uses a new type of nickel steel. This type of steel can increase the strength of the ship by 30%-40%. It has excellent impact resistance and corrosion resistance. The only problem is that the cost is much higher. The total cost is 218% of that of ordinary steel."

Nickel steel was developed through the collaboration between Chen Zhengwei's laboratory and Andrew Carnegie's laboratory. The patent is currently held by United Steel Corporation of America, in which the two jointly invested.

This type of steel has excellent properties in all aspects, the only problem is that its cost is too high, more than three times that of ordinary steel.

Ordinary steel costs $300 per ton, while nickel steel costs $1000 per ton.

"We named this armored cruiser Poseidon. It is 105 meters long, 18 meters wide, 5 meters deep, has a displacement of 7 tons, a main armor belt thickness of 5 mm, and a deck armor thickness of 6200 cm... The steam power is 178 horsepower and the speed is 70 knots... Nowadays, steam power is very mature, so we cancelled the auxiliary sails in the design of this battleship..."

"The main guns are four 203mm guns, and the secondary guns are four 120mm guns, which can provide sufficient medium-range firepower. As for the specific data of the guns, the boss needs to ask the weapons laboratory..."

"After Poseidon is built, it will be the world's top battleship! Even more powerful than the British battleships!" Peter Donahue's face flushed. He never thought that he would be able to design and build such a powerful battleship in his lifetime.

This Poseidon is enough to mark his place in the history of warship development.

The ship's speed and maneuverability far exceed that of a battleship.

The most advanced battleships in the UK today have a speed of about 14 knots, while the speed of a British cruiser will not exceed 16 knots.

Although its armor is slightly weaker than that of a battleship, its four 4mm caliber guns have a range of up to 203 meters, which is also the top level of firepower and is no worse than that of a battleship.

"Sounds good..." Chen Zhengwei flicked the blueprint in front of him with his finger, flipped through it for a while and said, "Cancel the four secondary guns. Replace them with eight or more small-caliber rapid-fire guns!"

Nowadays, the secondary guns of warships of various countries are almost all large-caliber artillery because there is no torpedo threat.

Although countries now realize the value of torpedoes, the technology is far from being practical, and the tactical value is almost zero.
There are still many pole-torpedo boats in France today, which are highly flexible small boats with a ten-meter-long wooden pole supported on them and explosives hung at the front.

The target of this type of ship is large armored ships such as battleships, and it needs to get within 5-10 meters to be effective.

This shows the current naval tactics of various countries.

However, Chen Zhengwei knew that the development of torpedoes would be very fast.

He himself has the most advanced torpedo in his hands.

Moreover, the firepower of the four 203mm main guns is sufficient, especially when the distance between the two sides is pulled to more than 4000 meters, and the one with optical rangefinder fights the one without optical rangefinder.

Unless the other party is really blessed by God... he can't think of how he can lose.

"How much does it cost?" Chen Zhengwei asked finally.

"$120 million!"

$120 million is just the cost of the ship, not including the guns.

But it doesn't make much difference to Chen Zhengwei.

"Arrange the construction!" Chen Zhengwei planned to build one ship first to see if there were any problems, and then continue to invest.

After all, the design of a warship is not as simple as that of a transport ship. It also involves aspects such as the position of the artillery, firing angle, recoil, center of gravity, etc., which cannot be designed by an ordinary shipyard.

Donahue had originally built cruisers for the navy, and later he thoroughly understood British battleships. He then designed light cruisers like the San Francisco, which enabled him to design armored cruisers of larger tonnage.

Even so, they dare not say that there will be no problems.

Then Peter Donahue took out another blueprint, which was for a frigate, with a displacement of only 1400 tons, which was larger than the current torpedo boats. The speed was 23 knots, with two 120mm main guns and three sets of six horizontal torpedo tubes.

Combined with the torpedo technology in Chen Zhengwei's hands, it can pose a sufficient threat to a cruiser with a displacement of 4000 tons.

In most "naval powers", this type of medium-sized frigate is an absolute main battleship.

However, in Chen Zhengwei's view, the significance of this frigate is reconnaissance, escort, near-shore defense, and supply line protection.

"Let's build one of these first! How long will it take to build?" Chen Zhengwei asked after putting down the blueprint.

"The Poseidon will take at least 12 to 15 months... the frigate will take 6 to 8 months..." said Peter Donahue.

"Let's start, as quickly as possible! We can draw workers from other shipyards." Chen Zhengwei nodded.

There are now 22 torpedo boats, and construction has been stopped. The shipyard even has time to accept an order for a cruiser from the US Navy, and is fully capable of allocating more manpower.

After Donahue and the others finished talking, Cicely also walked in from outside. There was still paint stains on her body, but she didn't look dirty, but full of vitality.

"I have asked someone to prepare lunch!" Cicely walked behind Chen Zhengwei and hugged his neck.

"You are lucky. You can eat before leaving! Didn't you come here at this time just to have lunch?" Chen Zhengwei said to Donald Hsu and others with a smile.

After Donald Hsu and his companions left, in the afternoon when Chen Zhengwei was basking in the sun and drinking soda in the yard, a car drove into the manor and two thugs got out and quickly came to Chen Zhengwei.

"Why are you in such a hurry? Did something happen?" Chen Zhengwei was lying on the recliner with a soda bottle in one hand.

"Something happened in the Philippines...Kang Youwei ran away. Some Chinese businessmen in Manila went to arrest him, and then that guy bribed the local Spanish businessmen and the police to arrest all the Chinese businessmen. It is said that he suffered a lot in prison."

"They said that the liar was the person you wanted... they were doing things for you. Those Spaniards had their eyes in the sky and ignored them. They even said they had never heard of you!"

After Gou Ye and others were captured, they were finally rescued with great difficulty. They hated the Spaniards so much that they exaggerated the situation in their telegrams to Lin Fuyuan.

Lin Fuyuan sent the telegram back to Los Angeles word for word.

"You haven't heard of me? The Spanish are very brave!" Chen Zhengwei raised his eyebrows after hearing what the henchman said, and the fierceness in his body also emanated, and he said with full of sarcasm:
"Eyes in the sky? Why do they have eyes in the sky? They are still living hundreds of years ago and think they are a naval power?"

“There’s everything in dreams!”

Chen Zhengwei estimated that there must be some water in what those people said, but it didn’t matter.

What’s more important is that there is such a good thing?
"First, Cuba sent a tough governor to cause trouble, and then he didn't give me face in the Philippines... I didn't plan to cause trouble in the past two years... But they were so brave, so I helped them!" Chen Zhengwei put the soda bottle on the table beside him, got up and went back to the house to change clothes.

He really didn't plan to cause trouble in the past two years.

On the one hand, the Panama Canal is now being prepared, on the other hand, it involves the construction of new warships, and the other is the Count of Toulouse.

He originally wanted to build two or three main battleships before going to trouble the Spanish, which would take at least three years.

But he is not going to cause trouble, it is up to others to cause trouble for him.

After a while, Chen Zhengwei changed his clothes and went downstairs.

"Are you going back?" Cicely looked at Chen Zhengwei who had changed his clothes, walked over and hugged his waist.

"There are some things to do! Some people don't give me face...then they don't need to give me face either!" Chen Zhengwei patted Cicely's butt and took the bus home.

After returning home, Chen Zhengwei went to the study and took out a map and a document, which was the information about Spain's current navy.

The Spanish Navy now has a total of 11 warships in service, including 38 steel warships, 18 wooden warships, and 14 other ships, with a total tonnage of about tons.

Among them, four of the more "advanced" armored ships launched in recent years are all in the domestic market.

They are the Infanta Maria Teresa with a displacement of 6500 tons, which was launched last year; the Peraya with a displacement of 6200 tons; the Alfonso XII with a displacement of 6400 tons, which was just launched this year, and the Vizcaya with a displacement of 6300 tons. In addition, there are several armored cruisers and protected cruisers.

Cuba has the 4500-ton armored cruiser Quinto de Ortega and the 2800-ton protected cruiser Barcelona, and Puerto Rico has the 3200-ton protected cruiser Madrid.

The Philippines has an armored cruiser, the Villard de Cueva, with a displacement of 4800 tons.

The rest were all wooden warships, some of which were even purely sail-powered. Half of them were wooden steam ships and the other half were sail-powered.

In fact, now is not a suitable time to start a war, because Spain has launched many warships last year and this year, all using new technologies.

Although Spain's technology was already backward, there was nothing worth noting about these warships except their tonnage and armor.

Then Chen Zhengwei took out the information about the US Navy...which was even weaker than Spain.

If we say in 1879, the US Navy and the Spanish Navy were similar.

In 1881, it was only slightly weaker than Spain.

But now...the US Navy is weaker than the Spanish Navy.

It was because of the Battle of Annapolis two years ago that Chen Zhengwei blew up five US Navy ships.

Last year and this year, Spain launched many warships.

Even though the US Navy also placed orders for some warships, the gap in strength between the two sides has become even greater.

(End of this chapter)