The Ming Dynasty has just been exiled and the Luzon system has awakened.

The trial operation of the first railway is definitely a big event, but Zhu Heyi's return to Dingtianfu this time is not just for this railway line.

South Bay Naval Base.

"Your Majesty, this is our new cruiser. A total of five ships of this class have been built. Two of them have been outfitted and can be delivered to the navy at any time. The other three will also be outfitted before the end of this month."

Zhang Hongfang pointed to several cruisers in the port and said with a happy face.

After more than half a year of rush construction, Nanwan Naval Shipyard finally brought new equipment to the Ming Royal Navy once again. (Don’t mention that the construction speed is too fast. The protagonist is fast, otherwise he may not be able to build a new ship for several years.)

Zhu Heyi looked at several warships with two chimneys in the port in the direction pointed by Zhang Hongfang, and the smile on his face became stronger and stronger.

Thanks to the success of Ranger's steam power, the shipyard directly installed 6 boilers and a steam engine on her when building this new class of ships.

Although she still retains three composite masts, she is different from the Guerrilla in that the main output power of this new class of ships has become steam power, and the sails have become auxiliary.

In addition, this new class of ship is also the first-class "ironclad ship" of the Ming Dynasty Royal Navy.

Of course, this armor still contains some moisture.

To be precise, this is a first-class iron-ribbed wooden hull ironclad ship. Its hull is still made of wooden structure as the main body, but the surface of the hull is covered with a layer of iron armor.

Different from the shameful three-millimeter thin paper of the Japanese navy, the entire new ship of this class is covered with 13 mm of iron armor, and at the waterline, the thickness of the armor is increased to 30 mm.

Under such circumstances, the only difference between her and the previous protective cruiser is that she lacks a layer of dome armor.

It can be said that with the protection of this layer of iron armor, even if the enemy sends a battleship, it may not be able to sink it.

The protective performance has been improved, and the armament on the ship has also been updated.

The new ships of this class are equipped with 12 Type 1691 30-fold caliber 130 mm single-mounted guns as the main weapons.

There is one gun at the bow and stern of the ship, and the remaining 10 naval guns are arranged in the gun profiles on both sides.

At first glance, it seems that there are fewer and fewer guns on new ships, but this new gun is completely different from the previous smoothbore gun.

The new artillery no longer uses the weight of the shell as the measurement standard, but changes to the magnification and caliber.

Yes, this is a breech-loading rifled gun.

This gun was a treasure that Zhu Heyi bought from the Miracle Market three months ago. It uses a wedge-type breech block to solve the airtightness problem of the breech-mounted rifled gun. Therefore, its range has reached 5 kilometers away, and its rate of fire has reached 5 rounds per minute.

In addition to 12 main guns, she is also equipped with 6 37mm rotary cannons as auxiliary weapons for deck cleaning. (Large Gatling)

Therefore, the firepower of this new cruiser is not weak at all.

本级巡洋舰标准排水量2375吨，满载排水量3010吨，舰长79米，宽11.5米，装备12门130毫米单装主炮和6门37毫米机关炮。

Six boilers provide her with 6 horsepower, allowing her to reach a maximum speed of 3000 knots. At the same time, the 16.5-ton coal bunker allows her to sail 400 nautical miles at an economical cruising speed of 10 knots, which is almost the same as if she sailed from Dingtianfu Set off and replenish coal on the way to reach Europe.

Such performance is no exaggeration to call it epoch-making in the current era.

"This class of cruisers is called the Mountain-class unprotected cruiser. The first ship is Taishan, and the remaining four ships are named in order according to the famous five mountains."

Emperor Zhu Da waved his hand and pointed at the warship closest to him in the port.

"Uh, no protection?"

After hearing His Majesty the Emperor's words, Zhang Hongfang seemed to have a few more black lines on his head.

In a world where all navies are still wooden ships, is it really appropriate to call one's own navy's "ironclad ships" unprotected cruisers?

But if there is no protection, there will be no protection. As long as His Majesty the Emperor is happy.

Zhu Heyi didn't know what Zhang Hongfang was thinking at this moment.

But even if he knew it, he would not change his name to another one.

First of all, the Mountain class is not a true ironclad ship.

Secondly, compared with the protected cruiser, she does not have dome armor.

Last but not least, I am happy that money cannot buy it. As the standard setter, if I say it is called an unprotected cruiser, then it will be called an unprotected cruiser.

Think about how the people of the Ming Dynasty and even the people of other countries in later generations will feel when they see records in history books that the unprotected cruiser Taishan of the Ming Dynasty Royal Navy sank a battleship of a certain country.

"Zhang Aiqing has done a good job! All ordinary employees at Nanwan Shipyard will receive double or triple wages this month, and technical staff will receive double wages. Aiqing will be promoted to Lieutenant of the Warship Shipbuilding Supervision Department and will be rewarded with 1000 dragon yuan!"

Emperor Zhu Da, who was in a good mood, immediately sent a wave of benefits to his younger brothers.

"Wei Chen thanks Your Majesty!"

The promotion and bonus made Zhang Hongfang smile.

At this time, Zhu Heyi pointed to the unfinished hulls in the other five slipways, which were much larger than the Mountain-class cruiser.

"Zhang Aiqing, I think shipbuilding should involve divergent thinking. Now with the rapid development of Ming artillery technology, the range of artillery is getting farther and farther. It is almost impossible for a single ship to be attacked on both sides in future naval battles."

"That being the case, has Zhang Aiqing ever thought of arranging all the main guns along the central axis of the ship's hull? This way, while reducing the number of guns, the firepower against the enemy on the side can still be maintained."

That's right, with the Mountain-class cruiser basically able to defeat warships from various countries in the current period, Emperor Zhu Da also resorted to the central axis turret arrangement that was only fully adopted after the super-dreadnoughts.

With the memory of his previous life, Zhu Heyi would naturally not let the Ming Navy follow the development path of warships in his previous life.

Why should I take the long route when I can take a shortcut?

In fact, after the emergence of steam-powered ironclads, there was no technical difficulty in arranging the turrets along the central axis.

The reason why warships arranged along the central axis appeared so late in previous generations was mainly due to limitations of traditional thinking and fire control technology.

Now, limited thinking does not exist with him.

And fire control?

What kind of fire control is needed when the common fighting distance is only a few hundred meters or even tens of meters?Just aim directly at the target and blast the hell out of it!

Zhu Heyi's words made Zhang Hongfang immediately put away his smile and fell into deep thought.

When he was young, he looked at Zhu He's face, his face was partly excited, partly embarrassed, and the rest was full of deep admiration for Emperor Zhu.

"Your Majesty, your views on battleship design really make me ashamed. However, it may be difficult to transform these five unfinished battleships into battleships with guns arranged on a central axis."

"Ai Qing misunderstood, how should we build these five unfinished warships? What I mean is that the new batch of warships can be designed and built in this direction."

Zhu Heyu waved his hand and said.

Having been in the navy in his previous life, he naturally understood that it was impossible to modify these five warships, and forced modification would only seriously affect their combat effectiveness.

Because if the turret is to be placed in the middle, it will inevitably affect its original cabin layout, and the length of the existing battleship simply cannot fit a few guns.

Except for the thousand-ton destroyers, the warships with turrets arranged on the central axis have a hull length less than 100 meters.

After listening to Zhu Heyi's words, Zhang Hongfang breathed a sigh of relief.

"In this case, I will live up to His Majesty's expectations and build new ships for our Ming Navy!"

……

The early twin-mounted artillery was two artillery pieces put together. The turret was driven by steam power, and it could be driven by 130 small water pipes.

最后

Many rivets and steamed steel, the turret is huge!

Hundreds of millions of stars, hundreds of millions of turrets!

More riveting and steaming, the turret is the first!

Billions of turrets, billions of glory!