Chapter 330： Battleship completed

初 In early October, when the autumn harvest began, the good news came from Emden Shipyard-the first 500-ton double-deck artillery deck ship was launched!

Marin immediately dropped the host of the autumn harvest ceremony and gave it to Jeffrey to host it. He himself, with a group of attendants, went straight to Emden Port, personally participated in the launching ceremony of the first battleship, and personally boarded the deck. Attend the inaugural ceremony.

500 This 500-ton warship was built at the beginning of the year with two 250-class armed merchant ships of Amerigo. But the difference is that the 250-class armed merchant ship, the Tholencher shipyard has already had a lot of construction experience, and with sufficient preparation, it was soon built.

However, this 500-ton warship was difficult to build because it had never been built before and its rib density was much higher than that of an ordinary armed merchant ship. It was not until the beginning of October that the construction was completed and the sea trial was launched.

In the North Sea, Marin and the sailors fully felt that the ship has good stability and flexible steering. It can be said that this ship fully reflects Marin's will.

Before the 250-class armed merchant ship built by Tholencher, Marin had long asked them to increase the aspect ratio to 4 to 1, but the stubborn Portuguese designer still set the ship's aspect ratio to 3.5 to 1. Moreover, the funeral home was also preserved.

But Marin's real requirement is to remove both the bow and the bow, and change the stern from circular to square, which is more conducive to steering operation. However, the stubborn Portuguese designer thinks that the layman Marin is a blind conductor and does not listen at all.

In desperation, after winning East Friesland, Marin had no choice but to set up a new shipyard in Emden and promote obedient designers to realize his intentions.

The new designer really obediently, modified the aspect ratio to 4 to 1, and cancelled the tall tower, and also changed the stern part into a square. In this way, the characteristics of the British Galen ship finally fully manifested.

Moreover, this warship, in full compliance with Marin's instructions, opened the side gun door on the side of the lower deck to realize a double-deck artillery deck. The lower guns have hinged gun covers. When sailing normally, the gun cover is tightly closed to avoid water ingress. Only during naval battles would the sailors pass the hinges, open the cannon cover, and use artillery on the lower deck.

Furthermore, because the artillery on the lower deck has a low center of gravity and a low moment of recoil, it can use artillery with a larger caliber than the upper deck.

For example, in the "Black Ship Incident", in the US warships, the 68-pound Pexang heavy artillery was placed on the lower artillery deck. However, if such a large-caliber heavy artillery is moved to the upper deck for firing, the moment caused by recoil will be very large.

Generally speaking, early heavy naval guns only had a 24 pound class. It was not until the early 19th century that the 36-pound Karen guns came on board.

Of course, the Karen gun was different from the earlier 24-pound gun. The early 24-pound naval guns were heavy guns with long barrels, and their weight was very heavy. Once the gun carriage moves due to recoil, it is difficult to reset. Because, it's too heavy ...

But the Karen gun is different. Although the diameter of the Karen gun is large, it can be very short. Former naval guns, such as the Hongyi Cannon, had a length of 3 meters, a caliber of only 110 mm to 130 mm, and a ratio of length to caliber of up to 20 to 30 times. The length of the Karen gun, which is only seven or eight times the caliber, appears very short.

In fact, because of the short body tube, the range of the Karen gun is not too long. However, in the short range, because the shell is large enough, it is still very powerful.

Moreover, the British guys who have been fighting for a long time in the sea have found that, during a sea battle, generally within 500 meters, they have a greater certainty to hit enemy ships. Over 500 meters, basically are sooters. And, within 500 meters of this grasp, only one or two percent hit rate.

Therefore, the farther the range of the heavy artillery, it doesn't really make much sense. Of course, it cannot be said that the range is far from useless, for example, the range of artillery is still very useful when attacking fixed targets on land.

For example, in the first Opium War, the British warships still using smoothbore guns used the Karen gun to attack the Qing's warships, but used 24 pound long barrel guns to attack land targets. Of course, when attacking the turret, the British warship also ventured close, using the Karen gun to volley together to hit the Qing turret.

Because of the low aspect ratio, the 36-pound Karen gun is no heavier than a 24-pound long-barrel gun, but the recoil is much smaller. In addition to the short range, the Karen gun is perfect in other aspects.

Thinking of this, Marin suddenly patted his head-he forgot to let the old John develop a short tube Karen gun ...

At the moment, this 500-ton warship, with a double-deck artillery deck, holds a total of 40 12-pound guns, which is very profitable. In addition, due to the thickening of the side deck, the warship itself is very resistant to artillery fire.

After all, in this era, no real warship has appeared. The more used in naval battles, that is, 6-pound guns and 3-pound guns. There are 12-pound guns, but the equipment rate is very low. Of the more than twenty artillery pieces in a warship, only one or two 12-pound cannons are equipped only at the bow. Unlike this battleship of Marin, all equipped with 12 pound artillery, the firepower is extremely powerful.

Moreover, in this era, many of the artillery of warships were bronze Fran guns, which had a range of no more than 2000 steps. Many artillery also use stone shells as shells.

However, the local tyrant Marin let the 12-pound cannons on the ship all use cast iron shells. Iron ball cannonballs not only have better air-tightness than stone shells, they can shoot farther, and their destructive power to wooden boats is much stronger than stone shells.

After a lap in the North Sea, Marin was very satisfied with the warship and personally named the Huffman series. This battleship was named Huffman 1.

Then, according to the data recorded during the construction of the warship, Marin ordered the secret steam bending department of the Emden shipyard to start manufacturing related molds based on the recorded data and preparing to batch process the ship's ribs. Next time, four Huffman-class battleships will be built together.

However, for the materials made by warships, the rib materials are easy to find. Because with the steam bending technology, the cost of manufacturing the ship's ribs began to be greatly reduced. But the main keel is more difficult to find.

Because of the construction of a 500-ton warship, the length of the main keel reached 30 meters. A keel of this length must be obtained by cutting 300-year-old oak trees.

因为 But because of the development of the marine industry, oak trees over 20 meters high in Europe have been declared strategic resources by the royal families, and their prices are also very high.

The asking price for a main keel is even higher than all the ship's ribs combined ...

This is also no way out. After all, Europe, as a civilized world, has developed for two or three thousand years, and the oak trees have been severely felled. Oak trees above 20 meters in height are rare now.

This is why Marin colonized North America, which is now an undeveloped area of ​​virgin forest density. It's not too easy to find a centuries-old oak tree that is 30 to 40 meters high.

Although there are not many white oaks in North America, many red oaks are dying. Red oak, like white oak, is also very suitable for shipbuilding. Moreover, the so-called North American white oak here means that it accounts for a small proportion of North American virgin forests. But North America is full of towering trees of several hundred years old at this time. Even if the proportion of white oak is very low, the total is very large. Therefore, Marin is also very promising in logging and shipbuilding in North America. The Spaniards were also aware of this, so in 1610, the center of the big shipbuilding, www.novelhall.com, was moved to Havana, Cuba, in order to facilitate the use of the rich local timber resources.

As for the mast, Marin previously required that the height of the mast not be less than the length of the hull, in order to maximize the sail area and speed up the ship.

For this, it's nothing. Because the mast is not soaked in seawater, it does not require corrosion-resistant wood. Like pine, it works. Even decks can use pine boards. Oak is only needed on the outside of the hull in contact with the sea.

Tall pines may not be easy to find in Western Europe. But in northern Europe along the coniferous Baltic coast, don't get too much pine. Therefore, Marin sent to the Teutonic salt ship to not only bring back a lot of profits, but also bought a lot of oak and pine wood for shipbuilding.

However, it is too inconvenient for merchant ships to transport oak for the main keel and pine for the mast. Because the length of these woods is longer than the merchant ship itself, it is very troublesome to transport. In order to transport such a long wood, the merchant ship spent a lot of manpower, tied the required wood to the sides of the ship, and wobbled it back to Emden for delivery to the shipyard.

While this year, the East Coast of North America will probably be found in Merigo, Guinea. However, Marin knew that the wood used for shipbuilding could not be used after being cut down, and it needed to be air-dried for one or two years.

Therefore, even if Marin sends a ship to North America to cut a large amount of wood, it cannot be immediately used for shipbuilding, but it needs to be air-dried for a long time before it can be put into use.

So, for now, Marin can only rely on buying large, air-dried wood from Eastern Europe to make big ships. Only when the logging base on the east coast of Marin North America is built, and sufficient oak is stored and air-dried, can a new shipyard be built in North America, and large-scale warships can be manufactured on-site on a large scale, which truly opens the era of Marin's dominance of the ocean ...