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When Vézé was young, he was very afraid of needles. The glistening, slender needles always made him feel indescribably uneasy and fearful. Even though he eventually learned that needles were nothing, this feeling of discomfort could never be completely eliminated.
However, this uneasy feeling made Wei Ze more interested in how to make this kind of hollow needle. In fact, the technology of this thing was very simple, especially the indigenous method of making it, which did not require so much precision. It was even easier. To prevent the iron from rusting, a slender steel needle could be wrapped with a thin sheet of silver-copper alloy. The more reliable silversmiths could quickly process it into a needle head.
As long as there were reliable silversmiths and coppersmiths, it was relatively easy to make a syringe. Even if they couldn't make a very round syringe, they could make a square syringe. This solved the problem of sealing the syringe and the propeller.
Before Vézé set out, he had already decided on the production plan. Vézé didn't lack silver, copper, or craftsmen. When he rushed back from You County to Yongxing, dozens of sets of medical equipment were already packed in the military medical equipment box made by the carpenters. These equipment included scalpels, probes, forceps, syringes, suture needles, catgut, a simple stethoscope covered with a skin membrane, and twenty to thirty other types of equipment. Although Vézé wasn't a medical student, Vézé could roughly remember the basic equipment that he had seen in real life and on television.
Not only did the skilled craftsmen produce medical equipment, but they also produced many tools such as wrenches and screwdrivers.
As for stationery, drawing tools, and drawing supplies, Vézé was even more experienced. He learned how to design propellers, so he was very familiar with a complete set of drawing tools. In this era, although Vézé didn't dare to boast that he could immediately make the best set of drawing tools, he dared to pat his chest and say, "I've used more drawing tools than you've ever seen."
The drawing pen was a dipping pen, which Vézé had played with since he was a child. Wrought iron nibs were prone to rust, and electroplating was impossible, so Vézé used copper coated iron nibs. There weren't many people in the army who could use this thing for a long time. A few hundred of them would be enough. As for Compass … All kinds of rulers and protractors, as long as one did not care too much about accuracy, could be made with an extremely fine pen.
The work of making stationery began when Vézé occupied Jianghua and Yongming. However, at that time, there was a lack of craftsmen. The apprentices selected from the Taiping army were not skilled enough. Along the way, Vézé had gotten his hands on more craftsmen. Vézé's own military department was getting more and more skilled, and the stationery and drawing tools were getting more and more refined.
The person in charge of the logistics department was Chen Zhe. This child did not look like a soldier at all. Instead, he gave off the vibe of a stubborn scholar. At that time, Vézé had spotted him among the crowd and had left a deep impression on him.
Chen Zhe was not an official, but he had been educated. Therefore, he had a common problem of scholars, which was that they looked down on others. This problem had caused him to be beaten many times when he first learned culture from Vézé. These days, when the boss ordered him to be beaten, the one who was beaten would feel that he was in the wrong. Moreover, Vézé never beat people to vent his anger. Chen Zhe also knew what was good for him. Every time he couldn't help but want to boss people around, he would feel a dull pain in his butt. Now, he could talk to people about the matter.
Seeing that Vézé had returned, Chen Zhe first reported the progress of the stationery and drawing tools. He said seriously, "Prime Minister, the pulley set, the iron chain, the mold, and the spring have been prepared."
In terms of weapons, Vézé was the most ambitious. Although he did not expect to be able to produce weapons on a large scale, he wanted to make a breakthrough. This time, the weapons were divided into three types: the Migne rifle, the fivefold smoothbore cannon, and the grapeshot bullet.
In Vézé's view, it was a shameful waste to invest a large amount of technical strength, energy, and resources on various excessive products before the appearance of the metal bullet. Therefore, Vézé chose the Migne rifle as the standard weapon that he would try his best to complete.
The Migne rifle was a type of flintlock rifle with three shallow rifling in the chamber. This was not the most important part. One of the two technical difficulties in producing this type of weapon was the round-nosed cylindrical lead bullet. This bullet was slightly smaller than the caliber of a rifle. In one fell swoop, it solved the awkward situation of the barrel being unable to be stuffed or blocked due to the bullet being too large for the front of the rifle. The Migne bullet could be easily pushed into the barrel with the ejection lever, greatly increasing the rate of fire. The bullet was threaded around the bullet to match the rifling. The center of the threaded bullet was stuffed with animal oil, and the bottom of the bullet was made of cork. When firing, the gunpowder gas would impact the cork, and the cork would suddenly expand the bullet. Due to the expansion of the bullet, the bullet could rely on the bullet itself to seal the chamber at the moment of firing. This way, the bullet would not leak out and cause the bullet to lose its kinetic energy. This solved the problem of the sealed chamber of the front loading rifle, greatly increasing the rate of fire, range, and reducing the risk of the chamber exploding.
The enthusiasts who lined up to be shot on the internet had written many illustrated posts about the indigenous production of the Migne rifle. Moreover, these posts had undergone a large number of repeated discussions, and there were even many people who had carried out the actual operation, posting pictures and videos of actual combat. What Vézé wanted to do was to try and turn these people's practice into reality.
The armies of Europe had long been equipped with the flintlock rifle, but the armies of the Manchu Qing still used the matchlock rifle. The firing mechanism of the flintlock rifle was relatively difficult to make. Vézé was not a fan of this type of weapon, so he only knew that there was such a thing. He had no idea what the firing mechanism of a real flintlock rifle looked like.
However, in Yongan, when Vézé was ambushing the Qing Army's grain transport team, he had snatched a double-barreled flintlock rifle from the Yellow Magua Guard. After that, Vézé often dismantled the rifle and carefully studied its internal structure. The blueprints had been drawn many times, and the people in the military department had also studied it many times. They had even carved a one-to-one model out of wood many times. Now, it was finally time for everyone to try and replicate it.
In Chenzhou, Vézé heard that there was an expert blacksmith who knew how to smelt steel, so he secretly "invited" this person to Yongxing. When the expert started to smelt steel, Vézé had already left with his troops. When Chen Zhe came to report that the plate spring was ready, Vézé knew that the expert really lived up to his name.
According to industrial production, the barrel had to be smelted first. Then, it had to be made into iron plates or iron pipes. However, Vézé skipped this step. He directly heated up the barrel of the matchlock rifle and hammered it into iron bars, which could be used to make new barrels. The Qing Army's matchlock rifles had a problem. They liked to make them thin and long. In theory, the larger the barrel, the longer the shooting range, but that was only in theory. In reality, this kind of gun often exploded. Even when Vézé and his troops were dealing with the Qing Army's broken guns, they would still take out the barrels. Therefore, the troops had collected quite a lot of useful weapons.
Vézé used a very safe method to make the barrel. First, he took out an iron plate, hammered it into a thin sheet, and rolled the long edge of the sheet onto a long cylinder to form a long barrel. The edges overlapped slightly, and then welded the two sides together.
This was only the beginning. Next, he took out a thin strip of iron plate, hammered it thin on both sides, and wrapped it around the first round barrel. The two thin sides overlapped each other, and finally welded the edges together.
Because a gun barrel had two layers, the weld on the inner wall was longitudinal, and the weld on the outer was transverse, the barrel was very strong. Although the design was simple, the blacksmiths from the logistics team had failed many times. It took them two days to finally make the first barrel.
The rifling was processed on a wooden drawing machine. The grooved rifling guide was pulled by two rings with a tenon inside. The diameter of the tenon was slightly larger than the guide. When the tenon slid through the groove, it would force the rifling guide to rotate according to the threads on it. A slender steel column was installed at the front of the guide and passed through the barrel. A blade was installed at the other end. The height of the blade was slightly higher than the wall of the barrel. Then, the guide was pulled, and the blade would engrave the rifling line on the wall of the barrel. After pulling, the height of the guide was adjusted, and the rifling was gradually deepened. After pulling for more than 20 times, a rifling was pulled. Then, the steel pipe was rotated 120 degrees, and the second rifling was pulled. Only after all three rifling were pulled could the barrel be considered complete.
The blade was made of high-carbon steel made by the expert who knew how to fry steel. The quality of this high-carbon steel was really not that great. After pulling one barrel, a gap appeared on the edge. However, Vézé did not care about this.
With the barrel and spring, all that was left was the butt, which was actually the easiest to solve. The butt was already prepared, and the melted lead was made into a Miné bullet according to the blueprint. The bayonet was also easy to make. It was just welding the end of the spearhead and an iron ring together.
With the combined efforts of more than ten people, it took them three whole days to make a Miné rifle! If they had started from an earlier time, the manufacturing process of this rifle could even be pushed back half a year.
The testing process was very barbaric. The barrel was filled with gunpowder, and a person pulled it from afar with a long rope. A gun barrel that was filled with gunpowder was like a detonator that was stuffed with gunpowder. Even though Vézé had seen people do this before, and knew that the European countries of the 19th century used this method to make gas pipes, he still felt uneasy.
However, the barrel withstood this huge pressure, and after a muffled sound, there was no scene of the barrel exploding. Vézé ran over to remove the barrel for inspection, but found that the barrel did not deform, and the welds that were knocked together did not crack. He finally breathed a sigh of relief.
The next step was live firing. After loading the rifle with bullets, it aimed at three wooden targets stacked on top of each other 100 steps away as shooting targets. Those who participated in the live firing were all subordinates that Vézé trusted. Before the test began, Vézé repeatedly asked this group of people to guarantee that no information would be leaked. So in the end, there were only five people from the General Staff, including Vézé. Vézé personally held the gun and fired.
The other four heads of the General Staff watched as Vézé aimed carefully, and felt that this action was too unnecessary. They were all used to using guns, and even if it was an extremely high-quality matchlock, the bullets would be long gone after 100 steps. However, since Vézé took this gun so seriously, they were too embarrassed to pour cold water on Vézé. They quietly waited to see the results of Vézé's test.
Vézé pulled the trigger. The sound of the gun was indeed very different from that of a matchlock, and so was the flash and smoke from the muzzle. The target began to shake violently. The four people were all shocked. They knew that Vézé would not lie, and that he could probably hit the target from 100 steps away. But when they really saw this kind of gun, they were also shocked.
After Vézé finished firing, he walked towards the target with the slender gun, and they quickly followed Vézé. When they were about 30 steps away from the target, Wei Changrong stopped. Wei Changrong, who was known for his bravery, could not help but shout, "Oh my god!"
The other three did not shout. This was not because they were calmer than Wei Changrong, but because the three of them were too frightened to speak. The three targets were lined up together, and they were all made of half-inch thick wooden boards. When the three targets shook together, everyone thought that the target in front moved the one behind it, but when they got closer, they saw clearly that all three targets had been pierced. The eye-catching holes were a silent testament to the incredible power of the gun.
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