King of German Mercenaries

At the beginning of October, at the beginning of the autumn harvest, there was good news from Emden Shipyard - the first 500-ton double-deck battleship was launched!

Marin immediately left the host of the autumn harvest ceremony and let Geoffrey preside on his behalf. He himself, with a group of attendants, went straight to the port of Emden, participated in the launching ceremony of the first battleship in person, and boarded the deck in person Participate in the maiden flight ceremony.

This 500-ton warship was built at the same time as the two 250-class armed merchant ships of Amerigo at the beginning of the year. But the difference is that the 250-level armed merchant ship, the Thorencher Shipyard has a lot of construction experience, and with sufficient preparation, it will be built soon.

And this 500-ton warship, because it has never been built before, and the rib density of the ship is much larger than that of ordinary armed merchant ships, it is very difficult to build. 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 was smooth and maneuverable. It can be said that this ship fully embodies Marin's will.

For the 250-class armed merchant ships built by Thorencher, Marin had already asked them to increase the aspect ratio to 4:1, but the stubborn Portuguese designer still set the ship's aspect ratio to 3.5:1. Moreover, the poop is still preserved.

But Marin's real request was to remove both the forecastle and poop, and to change the stern from a round shape to a square shape, which would be easier for steering maneuvers. However, the stubborn Portuguese designer thought that the layman, Marin, was a blind commander and did not listen at all.

No way, after winning the counties of East Friesland, Marin had no choice but to set up a new shipyard in Emden, and promoted obedient designers to realize his intentions.

The new designer was really obedient, modified the aspect ratio to 4:1, canceled the tall poop, and changed the stern part to a square shape. In this way, the characteristics of the British Galen ship are finally fully reflected.

Moreover, this warship, in full accordance with Marin's instructions, opened the broadside gun doors on the lower deck sideboard, realizing a double-layer artillery deck. The lower gun doors have hinged gun door covers. When sailing normally, the gun cover is tightly closed to prevent water from entering. Only in the event of a naval battle would sailors pass the hinges, open the gun hatches, and use the artillery on the lower deck.

Moreover, the lower deck artillery, because of the low center of gravity and the small moment generated by the recoil force, can use larger caliber artillery than the upper deck.

For example, in the U.S. warship in the "Black Ship Incident", 68-pound Peksang heavy artillery was arranged on the lower artillery deck. But if such a large-caliber heavy artillery is moved to the upper deck to launch, the moment caused by the recoil force will be very large.

Generally speaking, the early heavy naval guns were only 24 pounds. It was not until the early 19th century that the 36-pounder Karen guns were on the ship.

Of course, the Karen gun was different from the early 24-pounder. The early 24-pound naval gun was a heavy gun with a long barrel, and the gun body was heavy. Once the gun carriage moves due to recoil, it is difficult to reset. because it's too heavy...

But the Karen naval gun is different. Although the caliber of the Karen naval gun is large, the barrel is very short. In the past, naval guns, such as the Hongyi Cannon, were 3 meters long and had a caliber of only 110 mm to 130 mm. The ratio of length to caliber was as high as 20 to 30 times. The length of the Karen gun is only seven or eight times the caliber, which is very short and stubby.

In fact, because the barrel is very short, the range of the Karen cannon is not far. However, at a short range, because the shells are large enough, the power is still very large.

Moreover, the British who have been fighting for a long time have found that in a naval battle, generally within 500 meters, there is a greater certainty that they can hit the enemy ship. More than 500 meters, basically all are handshakers. Moreover, within 500 meters of this grasp, there is only one or two percent hit rate.

Therefore, no matter how far the heavy artillery is, it doesn't really make much sense. Of course, it cannot be said that the range is useless, for example, when attacking fixed targets on land,

The range of the artillery is still very useful.

For example, in the First Crow War, the British warships that were still using smoothbore guns used Karen guns to attack Qing warships, but used 24-pound long-barreled heavy artillery to attack land targets. Of course, when attacking the fort, the British warships also risked approaching, and used the Karen cannon to fire together in a salvo to hit the Qing army fort.

Because of the low aspect ratio, the 36-pound karen gun is no heavier than the 24-pound long-barreled gun, but the recoil is much less. In addition to the shortcoming of the relatively short range, in other respects, the Karen cannon is very perfect.

Thinking of this, Marin suddenly patted his head - he forgot to ask Old John and the others to develop a short-barreled Karen cannon...

At the moment, this 500-ton warship has a double-deck artillery deck, which accommodates a total of 40 12-pound heavy artillery, and the profit is very strong. Moreover, because of the thickening of the broadside deck, the warship itself has a strong ability to resist shelling.

After all, in this era, no real battleship has appeared. In naval battles, the 6-pounder and the 3-pounder are used more often. 12-pounder guns are also available, but at a low rate of equipping. Generally, among the more than 20 guns in a warship, only one or two 12-pounder guns are equipped on the bow of the ship. Unlike Marin's warship, all equipped with 12-pounder guns, the firepower is extremely powerful.

Moreover, in this era, many of the artillery of warships are bronze cannons installed in the rear, with a range of no more than 2000 steps. Many artillery pieces also use stone bullets as shells.

The local tyrant Marin made all the 12-pounder guns on the ship use iron balls cast by sand casting. Iron ball cannonballs not only have better air-holding properties than stone bullets, but also can hit farther, and their destructive power to wooden boats is also much more powerful than stone bullets.

After a lap in the North Sea, Marin was so satisfied with the warship that he personally named it the Hoffmann series. This warship was named Hoffman 1.

Then, according to the data recorded in the previous construction of the warship, Marin ordered the secret steam-bending department of the Emden Shipyard, which was independent of the shipyard, to start manufacturing related molds according to the recorded data, and prepare for batch processing of the ship's ribs. Next time, four Hoffmann-class ships will be built together.

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

Because, for the manufacture of 500-ton warships, the length of the main keel reaches 30 meters. A keel of this length must be obtained from a 300-year-old oak tree.

However, due to the development of the maritime industry, oak trees over 20 meters high in Europe have been declared as strategic resources by the royal families, and the price is also very high.

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

This is also something that can’t be helped. After all, Europe, as a civilized world, has developed for two or three thousand years, and the oak trees have been cut down a lot. Oak trees with a height of more than 20 meters are rare now.

That's why Marin colonized North America, which is still an undeveloped area with a dense forest of virgin forests. It is not easy to find a hundred-year-old oak tree that is thirty or forty meters high.

Although there are not many North American white oaks, there are as many red oaks as death. Red oak, like white oak, is also very suitable for shipbuilding. Moreover, the so-called North American white oak here is not much, which means that it only accounts for a small proportion of the virgin forest in North America. But North America is full of towering trees that are hundreds of years old at this time, and even if the proportion of white oak is low, the total number is very large. Therefore, it is also very promising for Marin to open a colonial point in North America to log ships and build ships. The Spaniards also realized this, so in 1610, they simply moved the center of building large ships to Havana, Cuba, in order to facilitate the use of the rich local wood resources.

As for the mast, Marin previously required that the height of the mast be no lower than the length of the hull to maximize the sail area and speed up the boat.

Nothing about this. Because the mast is not soaked in sea water, it does not need rot-resistant wood. Like pine, it will do the job. Even the decks can be made of pine boards. Oak should only be used on the outside of the hull in contact with sea water.

Tall pine may not be easy to find in Western Europe. But in northern Europe on the Baltic coast with dense coniferous forests, not too much pine. So Marin sent the Teutonic ships to sell salt, and not only brought back a lot of profit, but also bought back a lot of oak and pine wood for shipbuilding.

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

Although, within this year, Amerigo will be able to find about the east coast of North America. But Marin knew that the wood used for shipbuilding could not be used after being cut down, and it would take a year or two to dry before use.

Therefore, even if Marlin sent ships to North America to cut down a large amount of wood, it would not be immediately available for shipbuilding, but would need to be dried for a long time before it could be put into use.

So, for now, Marin can only rely on buying large, air-dried lumber from Eastern Europe for making big boats. Only when Marin's logging base on the east coast of North America has been built, and enough oak has been stored and dried, can a new shipyard be opened in North America to manufacture large-scale warships on the spot, truly opening the era of Marin's dominance of the ocean...