lcionline Chapter 33 Upgrading the Musket
Chapter 33 Upgrading the Musket
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After resolving the bandit problem, they unexpectedly discovered a large iron mine near the mountain stronghold. Liu Ye and Liang Xiaoming both felt a huge weight lifted from their shoulders. With a stable source of iron ore, they could now attempt to forge larger cannons, and address the pressing issue of bayonets!
Long before the Patriot rifles were officially delivered to the guard unit, Liang Xiaoming had already devised a method for manufacturing bayonets. However, at that time, limited pig iron resources and production capacity had to address the issue of whether or not there were rifles available. Now, pig iron was no longer a bottleneck, the rifles were nearing completion and would be deployed to 300 men, and the addition of a new blacksmith would alleviate the manpower shortage, freeing up resources to work on the bayonet project. Liang Xiaoming planned to first produce a prototype, and then proceed with mass production after its success.
Making a bayonet is no simple task. It's only about 0.5 meters long, yet it needs to maintain strength and toughness during repeated thrusts. If it's too hard, it will break easily; if it's too soft, it will deform easily. The difficulty of making a bayonet is no less than that of making a good sword. And these days, high-quality swords made from refined steel are not only very expensive, but also time-consuming and labor-intensive.
What Liang Xiaoming wanted to do was to achieve rapid, large-scale production of bayonets while controlling costs. The method he would use was the carburizing process, which is still in use today.
Carburizing is a common heat treatment process for metallic materials. It can give carburized workpieces a very high surface hardness and improve their wear resistance. The specific method involves placing the workpiece in a furnace containing a carburizing medium, heating it to 900-950 degrees Celsius, and holding it at that temperature for a sufficient time. This allows the active carbon atoms released from the carburizing medium to penetrate into the surface layer of the steel, resulting in a metallic workpiece with a high carbon surface while retaining its original composition in the core. This technique is still used today and is known as the "stainless steel quenching method."
The resulting metal workpiece has a surface layer with the high hardness and wear resistance of high-carbon steel, while the core retains the toughness and plasticity of low-carbon steel. Bayonets made in this way are sufficiently rigid on the outside, giving them an advantage in stabbing, while the internal toughness ensures they will not break.
Modern carburizing processes are highly sophisticated, using gaseous or liquid carburizing media such as methane and benzene, which were obviously unavailable in 1631. Liang Xiaoming adopted an ancient method—externally heated box carburizing technology.
The name sounds sophisticated, but it actually involves placing semi-finished bayonets made of low-carbon steel into a crucible or similar container, then covering them with charcoal, fermented black beans, and clay powder. The container is then heated from the outside—the charcoal and fermented black beans are used for carburizing, and the clay powder is a dispersant. The advantage of this carburizing technique is that the carburized material is very uniform and stable, with a high carbon potential, resulting in excellent efficiency and effectiveness. This method is recorded in ancient texts, although Song Yingxing used it to make embroidery needles, while Lin Weiye used it to make bayonets.
This type of bayonet is not the thin, flat blade of a modern bayonet, but rather a long, triangular cone. Considering that it would be used frequently in close combat with melee weapons in the future, a thick cone would obviously be more robust than a blade. Such a structure is more appropriately called a bayonet; calling it a bayonet is merely a matter of modern thinking.
After making the sample, Liu Ye tested its sharpness and toughness. It easily pierced through two layers of wood about the thickness of a thumb. He then stirred it up and down and left and right, causing wood chips to fall off, but the bayonet did not deform at all. If it were a sword, it would have broken if it were stuck in the wood and bent horizontally. He then took a thin iron plate and forcefully inserted it, piercing through it again. The bayonet showed no wear, indicating that it would be no problem to deal with enemy armor in the future.
He laughed heartily, "Mingzi, you really have a way! Now our team is armed with rifles and bayonets, so we're not afraid of hand-to-hand combat anymore."
Liang Xiaoming was also very proud of himself. He picked up a rifle with a pre-installed bayonet mount, which made it easy to install and remove the bayonet. After attaching the bayonet, he said to Liu Ye, "With the bayonet attached, the Patriot rifle is nearly 1.9 meters long, almost like a spear. In the future, when we enter close combat, it can be used as a spear. We can abolish spearmen and have all firearms-equipped soldiers, who will be capable of both long-range attacks and close-quarters combat!"
Liu Ye looked at it and noticed something strange: "Why is the bayonet mounted on the right side? Aren't bayonets usually below the muzzle?"
Liang Xiaoming explained, "This is a muzzle-loading smoothbore gun. It is mounted on the right side for better loading. Only in the era of breech-loading guns would it be mounted below the muzzle."
He held up his left hand and gestured at the muzzle of the gun. "Look, if it's mounted at the bottom, won't it cut my hand when loading?"
Liu Ye nodded: "It seems that the person who designed the bayonet for the muzzle-loading rifle learned a bloody lesson! Although mounting it on the right side is a bit awkward, practicality comes first."
The prototype was successfully made, and mass production can begin now. The weaponry issue has been largely resolved; they have rifles, bayonets, and artillery. Compared to the military strength of Qiongzhou Prefecture, the guards are armed to the teeth, and Liu Ye is no longer content to remain confined to a small corner of Lingao.
He and Liang Xiaoming started their fortune at the saltworks. With Liang Xiaoming's help, they took a technical approach and began to establish themselves in Lingao, with a bright future ahead. However, their foundation was still shallow, and their weaknesses were obvious. The workers, craftsmen, and iron mines had all been dealt with, and now the last and most important weakness was food.
Liu Ye thought and thought but couldn't come up with a good solution, so he called everyone together to discuss it and see what suggestions they had.
Liang Xiaoming has never been interested in such questions. While he sits here, he is thinking about how to build a larger cannon at the right time.
Li Fu was quick-witted. After thinking for a moment, he said to Liu Ye, "Master, we have silver; we can buy grain..."
Liu Ye interrupted him in frustration, saying, "Previously, the price of rice in Lingao County had already risen due to the need to supply food for the laborers building the shipyard. Now, with three hundred guards, six hundred surrendered soldiers, and over a thousand workers and craftsmen, how much silver will we have to spend on food? Even if the price of rice doesn't rise, the expenses are still huge. Relying entirely on buying food is not a long-term solution. Currently, only our textile factory has income. The salt fields are not exporting now, and the arsenal, steel mill, and shipyard are all burning through cash—if it weren't for the windfall we made from attacking Tangjiazhuang and Wanhualou in Hangzhou, we would have collapsed long ago."
Everyone agreed, and Li Ergou added, "Moreover, the county's grain production is not high, and the grain reserves are also limited. Even if we had silver, we couldn't buy that much."
Li Fu continued, “My lord, if the local grain supply is insufficient, we can purchase it from other places. However, the grain production in other prefectures and counties of Qiongzhou Prefecture is not high, and the price of rice in Guangdong is much higher than in Qiongzhou, so neither is a good place to buy grain. I have made several trips to Guangzhou and heard people say that Siam and Annam are major grain-producing areas, with three harvests a year, but the yield is much higher than in Qiongzhou, and the price of rice is very low. People from Guangzhou have been transporting grain south to sell, and they have made a considerable profit. As for the fact that the income is insufficient to cover the expenses, it is not a big problem. Your shipyard has been completed. Once the ships are built and set sail, whether to Japan or Southeast Asia, it will be a business of great wealth, and the money will no longer be an issue.”