Chapter 354: We have guns and cannons!

Yelu Qi stayed in Mount Zhongnan for more than ten days. He was so obsessed that he didn't want to leave. Unfortunately, he had to go. He took the list given by Xin Zhen and quickly returned to Jingzhao.

"Master, do you think Yelu Chucai can give us the items on the list? Those items are all Mongolian treasures.

Craftsmen might be easier to deal with, as all they could do was create an accident where the craftsmen ran away and conceal the matter. But it would be difficult to fool the mines, granaries and the like, right?
In fact, the granary was fine. After the grain was transported out, the granary was burned and the blame was put on the rebels, and nothing would happen.

But the mine must continue to be mined. Meng Ting only needs to send someone to investigate and everything will be clear.”

The young Taoist priest who was in charge of making a list asked Xin Zhen.

Xin Zhen smiled and said, "Don't worry about it. Prime Minister Yelu is a rare smart man in the world. He will naturally find a way. We just need to tell him what we need, and he will naturally help us get it."

What Xin Zhen said was indeed correct. Soon Yelu Qi came back with hundreds of craftsmen. He then told Xin Zhen that people could be sent to take over the granaries in Hebei, Henan, Shaanxi and other places, and his father had already made arrangements.

Xin Zhen asked how Yelu Chucai operated it, and Yelu Qi laughed and said, "The granary thing is easy to operate. Find a few warehouse rats as scapegoats. When the grain is emptied, burn the granary and push the warehouse rats out.

It is not easy to arrange the mines, but there are solutions. We can just create some mine accidents or submit some documents to prove that the mines have been exhausted and abandoned. Then the Quanzhen Sect will take over. However, it is not that easy to transport the minerals out."

Xin Zhen smiled and said, "Don't worry, Minister Zhongshu. We will find a way."

Yelu Qi smiled and said, "My father also believes that Master has a way, but it really took a lot of effort to bring so many craftsmen out this time.

First, a big fire was created, which burned down most of the artisans' camp. This was not a big problem. The most difficult part was to bring the artisans here. So many people would be too eye-catching.

But my father also has a solution. He can directly register these people as laborers. With the documents in hand, they can pass through all the checkpoints easily."

Xin Zhen laughed when he heard this. With Yelu Chucai helping him dig out Kublai Khan's legacy, things were indeed much easier.

However, the time window was too short, so Yelu Chucai could only take action when Kublai Khan had just died and Mongolia had not yet sent anyone to take over. At that time, there was chaos everywhere, so he had the opportunity to take action. Once the situation stabilized, it would be difficult for Yelu Chucai to take action again.

But Xin Zhen was also quite satisfied.

With these hundreds of craftsmen to start with, his weapons and equipment should not be a problem. With these craftsmen leading him, and continuing to recruit disciples, it would not be a big problem to expand the team to thousands or tens of thousands of craftsmen.

The granary will solve the problem of military food during the period of rapid expansion of the rebel armies in various places. Once the expansion is completely completed, food will no longer be a problem.

The mines are to solve the problems of steel, gold and silver. Although I disagree with this, it must be done. Relying on Quanzhen Sect to reopen the mines is too slow and requires too much investment. It would be much easier to directly take over the Mongolian mines.

Once all these things are in place, all the craftsmen need to do is solve the problem of mass production of shotguns, and then the time for a full-scale counterattack will have come.

The shotgun was an idea for future firearms that was provided by Xin Zhen, and then designed and modified by craftsmen. It was a product that seemed quite strange in the eyes of later generations after compromising with current technology and materials.

The design of the shotgun is extremely simple. The barrel is a smoothbore round tube with a diameter of 20 mm and a length of 80 cm. It is made of hundred-fold steel. The inner wall is polished on a wooden lathe to ensure that the inner wall of the barrel is smooth. The outer wall is carefully polished by a craftsman and measured with a caliper to ensure that the outer wall is uniform (this is very important to ensure that the barrel is evenly stressed.

The bolt is a thicker, bottom-closed sleeve with a larger caliber than the barrel, which is placed at the end of the barrel. There is a protrusion at the bottom of the sleeve, which serves as a firing pin. When in use, the shotgun is loaded into the end of the barrel, and the sleeve is placed at the end of the barrel. The shooter pulls the barrel back suddenly, and the barrel moves backward. The primer at the bottom of the ammunition in the chamber hits the bottom of the sleeve and finally fires.

The principle is extremely simple. There is no such thing as a trigger hammer. The quality of spring steel is difficult to guarantee, and the trigger hammer is a pure burden.

The most important thing is that even if this structure explodes, it is almost impossible to cause harm to the shooter because the casing and barrel have two layers of metal protection.

If it misfires, just pull the barrel forward and continue to try to fire it a second time.

Xin Zhen was originally worried that the gun barrel was not strong enough, but the performance of the hundred-fold refined steel itself was not too bad, and the craftsmen were very smart to appropriately thicken the barrel, and did not increase the mass too much to ensure safety and performance.

Although this gun is a bit heavy, it is only a bit heavy and ordinary people can use it.

The gun still uses black powder as the propellant. Xin Zhen originally thought this would be a bit difficult, but unexpectedly the craftsmen thought it was not a big problem.

Saltpeter and sulfur, common materials for alchemy, were in stock in large quantities among the people. Of course, if they were to be used on a large scale, specialized mines would be needed. So Xin Zhen turned his attention to the Mongols, and Yelu Chucai indeed obtained several mines nearby.

Not to mention carbon, the only thing that needs to be improved is the proportion, and some starch should be cooked to granulate the black powder to increase its power.

In principle, shotgun shells and several 8mm lead bullets are used as the projectile form, which is no problem at all.

The shell is of traditional modern shotgun model, and the bottom of the shell is made of brass. Each one is first cast and then finely carved with steel tools.

Xin Zhen provided a suggestion, which was to use an assembly line, with each craftsman responsible for a process, to produce a large number of bullets. After completion, they would be tested with calipers. Compared with modern shotgun shells, there was no difference except that they were thicker.

The cartridge case is made of dozens of layers of paper with properties similar to kraft paper. The outside is coated with wax to make it waterproof, and the inside is filled with black powder and loaded with lead bullets. The top is folded up and sealed with wax.

The primer is Boxer type, and the shell is stamped from thin copper sheet (the stamping pressure is very small, and it can be stamped by hitting it hard with a hammer.

The firing powder in the primer is a mixture of red phosphorus and saltpeter. The red phosphorus comes from white phosphorus, and the white phosphorus comes from human urine.

The phosphorus-nitrogen mixture will explode when it is hit, and the flame will ignite the black powder through the flash hole of the shell. The black powder will explode and launch lead bullets, and the high-speed shotgun shells will fly around at high speed to kill the enemy.

In principle, cartridge cases need to be recycled due to their high cost.

The reason for using shotgun shells is mainly because shotgun shells have low chamber pressure and their area-killing effect can make up for some lack of accuracy. This is a compromise made to make up for the difficulty of rifling processing.

Xin Zhen has tested it and found that most ordinary soldiers' armor cannot withstand this crude shotgun. Once hit, they will be seriously injured if not killed, and the same goes for horses.

It can be said that after the collision between Xin Zhen and the craftsmen, this set of shotguns was finally finalized. It was a shame in the eyes of other time travelers, but for Xin Zhen, a time traveler from the infinite world, it just had to be sufficient.

Where there are guns, there are naturally cannons. Technically speaking, cannons are easier to make than guns. Of course, they are not the high-tech cannons of later generations, but the red cannon and the like.

(End of this chapter)