Chapter 356: Artillery Test

The three artillery teams completed loading and fired in turn.

In the first round of test firing, although none of the three artillery pieces hit the target, the landing point of the shells was very close to the target.

You know, the target of this test is 2 miles away from the artillery.

This distance has exceeded the effective range of the Qing army's artillery of the same level, and it can maintain such a high shooting accuracy at such a long distance.

Hong Mingxiang couldn't help but sigh at the excellence of Western artillery and the exquisite artillery technology.

After correcting the parameters, the three gunners continued to fire.

In the second round of artillery firing, both rifled guns hit the wooden target, while the smoothbore guns of the same level did not hit the target until the third round of artillery firing.

Such accurate artillery firing opened the eyes of Hong Mingxiang and others.

The basic requirement of the Qing army for artillery is to fire the shells out of the barrel, and the highest requirement is to hit a general area at most.

Hong Mingxiang didn't expect that the artillery could actually shoot wherever it was pointed, and it was so accurate, which overturned Hong Mingxiang's understanding of artillery.

After the 1000-meter target test, the next test was 1300 meters, 1500 meters, and the maximum effective range test.

In the 1300-meter shooting test, the hit rate of the smoothbore gun was further reduced, and it became very difficult to hit the target, while the two rifled guns were still able to maintain a relatively high hit rate.

Such an outcome was also within Liang Yao's expectations. The 6-pound smoothbore gun produced by the Sacramento Arsenal has a maximum effective range of 1300 meters.

Since the next test has exceeded the maximum effective range of the 6-pound smoothbore gun, the 6-pound smoothbore gun withdrew from the next test, and the 6-pound muzzle-loading rifled gun and breech-loading rifled gun continued to carry out the next test.

After the test, the three gunners and the staff of the Sacramento Arsenal conducted a test summary of the three 6-pound smoothbore guns.

There is no doubt that in terms of range and accuracy, the two rifled guns are obviously superior to the smoothbore guns.

If the two rifled guns are compared further, the accuracy of the muzzle-loading rifled gun is slightly higher than that of the breech-loading rifled gun.

Of course, the smoothbore gun is not without merit. The smoothbore gun causes greater damage to the target, which means that the power is more considerable.

In terms of power, the muzzle-loading rifled gun is also better than the breech-loading rifled gun.

The reason for this situation is that the air tightness of the early breech-loading guns was poor, and the air tightness problem also affected the range.

In terms of maximum effective range, the maximum effective range of the 6-pound smoothbore gun is 1,300 meters, the maximum effective range of the 6-pound breech-loading rifled gun is 1,600 meters, and the maximum effective range of the 6-pound muzzle-loading rifled gun is 1,700 meters.

Combining the above data and actual performance, the muzzle-loading rifled gun seems to be the best choice.

However, there is one data of the breech-loading rifled gun that is more eye-catching, that is, the rate of fire is faster than the muzzle-loading gun.

The next tests were various 8-pound, 10-pound, and 12-pound guns. The huge power and recoil generated by the firing of these large-caliber cannons shocked Hong Mingxiang and his entourage.

But the test of these guns was not the test that Liang Yao was most concerned about. The test that he cared about most was the test of the last four Armstrong guns.

The artillery team participating in the test was full of curiosity about this new artillery that had never been seen before.

Since there was no ready-made instruction manual on how to use this kind of artillery, no personnel from the Amster company who participated in the test of the new artillery were found this time.

Liang Yao and the French engineers who had been in contact with the Amster gun could only tell these artillery teams how to use these new artillery based on their own experience.

After figuring out how to use these artillery, the two teams began to test the two new breech-loading guns separately.

As for the other two breech-loading guns, they will not participate in the test for the time being.

Liang Yao currently only has these four 6-pound Armstrong gun samples, and he always has to prevent accidents during the test that would cause all the foreign guns to be damaged.

Although these guns are still experimental guns, their performance is already quite impressive. The new tail bolt shooting makes the airtightness of the Armstrong gun better than the breech-loading rifled guns tested before.

The firing rate has reached an astonishing 6 rounds per minute, that is, one round every 10 seconds.

The two artillery teams participating in the test even said that as long as they are trained for a period of time, they can increase the firing rate to seven rounds per minute or even higher.

The same breech-loading rifled gun, the same 6-pound gun, the range of the Armstrong gun is 500 meters higher than the 6-pound breech-loading rifled gun produced by the Sacramento Arsenal, reaching an astonishing 2,100 meters.

The artillerymen were amazed by the performance of this new artillery, and they all said that this was the best performance artillery they had ever seen, without this one.

Some even asserted that this was a weapon that could change the balance of war.

Liang Yao listened carefully to the opinions of these artillerymen, and they all hoped that this kind of artillery could be equipped to the troops as soon as possible.

Liang Yao was also very satisfied with the performance of this new breech-loading gun. He handed over the relevant technical drawings and four sample guns to the artillery department of the Sacramento Arsenal.

He asked the artillery department to digest the technology of Armstrong Company in the shortest possible time and to imitate the replicas with performance not inferior to these sample guns.

In the future, not only the artillery will need to be equipped with this excellent breech-loading gun, he also wants to move this breech-loading rifled gun to warships.

After feasting his eyes on the feast, Hong Mingxiang asked Liang Yao: "Brother Liang, I see that you have a very sufficient number of people for an artillery team. You use 6 people to serve one gun. In my opinion, with the quality of Brother Liang's artillery, 3 people can definitely do well from now on." One cannon, why don’t Brother Liang free up his wealthy manpower and build more artillery teams?”

Hong Mingxiang felt that it was too wasteful to equip one artillery with 6 people. The number of people in each artillery team could be reduced.

"There are too many uncertainties on the battlefield. If I only equip an artillery team with three people, and if the number of soldiers is reduced due to illness or injury, wouldn't this team be useless?" Liang Yao answered Hong Mingxiang's doubts, "But what if There are 6 people in a team. Even if the team is reduced by more than half, the artillery team can theoretically still exert its combat effectiveness. "

"I've been taught a lesson. Brother Liang has thought carefully about it." Hong Mingxiang was enlightened and expressed that he had been taught a lesson.

"Hongjunmen has also seen cannons now. I wonder how many cannons Hongjunmen wants to buy?" Liang Yao asked.

"How much does a 6-pound smoothbore gun cost? Is a smoothbore gun cheaper than a rifled gun?" Hong Mingxiang began to inquire.

Liang Yao told Hong Mingxiang the prices of the 6-pound rifled cannon and the 12-pound rifled cannon, which were around US$700 and US$1,500 respectively, but did not tell Hong Mingxiang the price of the smoothbore cannon.

In Hong Mingxiang's view, the smoothbore cannon's performance was impressive enough, and it was better than all the artillery currently equipped by the Qing army.

If smoothbore cannons were cheaper, Hong Mingxiang would be more willing to buy more smoothbore cannons with a limited budget.

"The 6-pound smoothbore cannon costs US$500 each, and the 12-pound smoothbore cannon costs US$1,200 each." Liang Yao thought about it and gave the price.