The Song Dynasty on the Sand Table

Chapter 238: Rebel Army's Firearms

More than half a year has passed since the last battle with the Jin army.

The rebel army now has a wide range of firearms, in addition to the Ming Dynasty bird guns and tiger squat cannons that have been mass-produced and used before.

The rebels were also equipped with some rifled guns, but the number was small, only fifty.

The reason why there aren't many of these things is simple: rifling is difficult to produce.

Before the "precision machining" technology tree was opened, rifling had to be manually drawn by blacksmiths. This was difficult to make, time-consuming and labor-intensive, and could easily be ruined by a "shake of the hand", making it difficult to equip it on a large scale.

In addition, the rebels have not yet mastered the technology of "breech-loading rifles" and are currently using muzzle-loading rifles.

The rifling will greatly reduce the loading speed of the muzzle-loading gun!

Now the fastest soldier in the rebel army can only fire two bullets per minute with a rifle. Ordinary soldiers are even slower, taking two minutes to fire three bullets.

The rebels are now dealing with large-scale cavalry, so rate of fire is actually more important than accuracy.

Therefore, Yue Wenxuan let most of the soldiers continue to use smoothbore rifles, and only equipped fifty sharpshooters with rifled rifles to snipe the enemy's Meng'an or Mouke.

Next up is the heavy musket!

The rebel army, led by Zhang Dashu, formed a heavy musketeer unit.

There weren't many people, just two hundred.

Heavy muskets do not have rifling, all are smoothbore guns.

After many tests, everyone determined that the effective armor-piercing range of the heavy musket was only ten feet.

At a distance of more than ten feet, even heavy muskets cannot penetrate the Iron Pagoda.

The smoothbore rifle has a decent hit rate within ten feet and will not fly in strange directions, so there is no need to rifle the heavy musket to reduce its loading speed.

At last……

And four smoothbore cannons!
It's still a smoothbore, not rifled.

Because rifling is more difficult to use on a cannon than on a musket.

Rifled cannons are not only difficult to manufacture, but also difficult to load. Moreover, the rifling will "leak", which will weaken the kinetic energy of the projectile when it leaves the barrel, shorten the range, reduce the initial velocity, and naturally weaken the power.

In addition, the power of a cannon far exceeds that of a musket. Every time it is fired, the barrel will be greatly worn. A barrel with rifling will break down faster, while a barrel without rifling can be used longer.

Whether from the perspective of ease of use or economy, the Rebel Army is now more suitable to use smoothbore cannons.
-
at this time……

There was a bustle and excitement in the rebel camp, and the soldiers were carefully preparing their firearms.

Every musketeer must ensure that his musket is in the best condition, the barrel must be cleaned, the casing must be polished to a shine, and the oilcloth bags containing ammunition and bullets must be dry and not get even a little wet.

Yue Wenxuan's possessed spirit, He Wang Zhaoye, did not sit still in Jimo this time. Instead, he personally came to the "front line" in Jiaoshui County and walked around the barracks, encouraging the soldiers whenever he had time: "Come on! Fight well!"

What does come on mean?
The soldiers were a little confused...

Seeing their dazed faces, Yue Wenxuan remembered that the word "refueling" was a term that was only coined after the advent of gasoline-powered cars. People today still don't understand it. He patted the soldiers on the shoulders and said earnestly, "When fighting, you'll use up some of the fuel in your waist. Refueling means you'll use up some of the fuel in your waist so you can use more force to hit your opponent."

The soldiers suddenly realized: "The prince is really knowledgeable."

"Following the prince, I learned a new word."

"We need to step up our game! Kill the gold thieves!"

"Ahhh!" The thirty-second eunuch who was "visiting" with the army couldn't help but touch the fat on his waist. He was pampered and plump, and there was quite a lot of fat on his waist...

"Your Highness!" the eunuch whispered. "I'm a little confused by your weapons. Why are they all just lumps of iron, all sorts of iron pipes, iron cylinders... With all this iron, why aren't you using it to build more heavy armor, but instead using it to make these strange weapons? It's truly baffling."

"Heavy armor?" Yue Wenxuan turned around and said with a smile, "Eunuch, how many heavy armored infantrymen does the Song Dynasty have?"

"A lot!" said the Thirty-Second Eunuch. "Both the Western Army and the Imperial Guard have large numbers of heavily armored infantry, several thousand."

Yue Wenxuan: "Can they defeat the gold thieves?"

Thirty-second uncle: "..."

This is very embarrassing!

The Song Dynasty's heavily armored infantry, when fully armored, were essentially dismounted Iron Pagodas, looking incredibly formidable. If they advanced in formation head-on, almost no one would be able to resist them.

but……

They can't push it!

They are just a group of armored pygmy cats. Their essence has not changed, and their best skill is still meowing, not fighting with claws.

Once they encounter the enemy, the most favorite thing for these heavily armored infantrymen to do is to help each other take off their armor. You help me take it off, I help you take it off. After taking it off, everyone feels as light as a swallow and can use light skills more smoothly.

Yue Wenxuan smiled and said, "Eunuch, heavy armor cannot save the Song Dynasty! So I can't invest all my iron into heavy armor. I don't have the confidence that after I equip my soldiers with heavy armor, they will be able to fight against the Iron Pagoda. So I have to find a new way to fight the Jin thieves."

Father-in-law: "Then what are these iron rods and iron cylinders used for?"

Yue Wenxuan: "I can't tell you now. You'll know when the fight starts."

When the thirty-second eunuch saw Yue Wenxuan's calm and confident expression, he thought: These iron things might be really powerful. We have to keep an eye out and watch them carefully so that we can report to the authorities after we go back.

As the two were talking about this, they saw Madam Gong Er coming.

The thirty-second eunuch immediately showed a subtle expression on his face and hid behind Zhao Ye.

In the eyes of outsiders who are not in the know, Gong Er Niangzi and He Wang Zhaoye, one is a gangster and the other is a royal aristocrat, are not the same kind of people at all. They just take advantage of each other and are wary of each other, and sooner or later a conflict will occur.

But Madam Gong Er didn't think so. She had received "instructions from the True Lord" long ago and knew that Zhao Zai was just an empty shell, a "ghost pulled back from the gates of hell" by the True Lord. Sooner or later, the True Lord would take Zhao Zai back to heaven and would not play tricks with her.

So her attitude towards the king was normal. She clasped her fists and said, "The prince is here."

Yue Wenxuan smiled and said, "Come to the front line and take a look. It will be good for morale if I come to the front line more often."

Madam Gong Er nodded and stopped talking. She continued to walk around the camp, supervising the soldiers' preparations.

After watching her walk away, the Thirty-Second Eunuch finally came out from behind Yue Wenxuan and said in a low voice, "She is quite respectful to the prince."

Yue Wenxuan smiled and said, "Stop having those evil thoughts and unite to resist the Jin. The most important reason why the Song Dynasty could not defeat the Jin bandits is that they were too exhausted from internal friction. If the important officials in the court had not excluded each other, the Jin bandits would have been driven back to the Songhua River long ago."

Thirty-Second Grandfather: "Ah? Where is the Songhua River?"

Yue Wenxuan rolled his eyes and said nonsense: "The birthplace of Songhua preserved eggs."

Thirty-Second Uncle: "What are Songhua Preserved Eggs?"

Yue Wenxuan: Holy crap, Songhua preserved eggs haven't been invented yet? The Song Dynasty was so damn backward.

(End of this chapter)