In recent years, the Portuguese have also begun to gradually imitate many things of the Tang Empire, and many industrial products that require machinery and equipment cannot be imitated, but some things that are purely conceptual changes have been quickly learned by the Portuguese!

In this way, you will see in Malacca, whether it is the Portuguese or the Tang Navy, they all use a large number of new Tang ships!

However, the imitation of the Portuguese is only limited to these things that do not have much requirements for manufacturing technology, such as steam engines, the Portuguese have long known that the Tang Empire has such a thing as a steam engine, after all, the Tang Empire has used steam engines on a large scale for many years, although in the past they were low-pressure industrial steam engines, but they were also steam engines.

Even they obtained several low-pressure steam engines produced by the Tang Empire through hidden channels, and tried to imitate them, but they didn't even understand the theory, at most, they let the craftsmen hand-build various parts and components one by one, and then assemble them.

And it turned out to be an egg!

They put the hand-made parts together, ran them on a fire, and then they fell apart with a bang, and they couldn't figure out why.

Without a matching scientific and theoretical basis, without strong precision machining, and the production capacity of special materials, it is not expected to be able to imitate the steam engine of the Tang Empire.

There are a lot of special parts, which are not just used by craftsmen who just take a piece of iron and knock it and imitate it!

For high-precision industrial products such as steam engines, the Portuguese can only look at them at most, but they are powerless about how to imitate them, and even for some other industrial products, although the Portuguese know, they basically can't produce them, or they are barely produced in a primitive manual way, but in the end, whether it is output or cost, they are far inferior to the Tang Empire.

Even more often, the cost of their manual imitation is much higher than the cost of production in the Tang Empire.

For example, steel, the steel enterprises in the Tang Empire, which used a lot of machinery and equipment for large-scale production, while other countries, regardless of whether they were indigenous tribes or other countries, such as the Portuguese, they still stayed at the level of very primitive handmade steel.

As a result, the price of steel produced by the Tang Empire is far cheaper than that produced by hand, taking the typical products of steel products exported by the Tang Dynasty, that is, all kinds of cold weapons and plate armor as examples.

Even if you add shipping costs and high profits, the price is lower than the cost of building it by hand.

For example, the price of the flagship product of export plate armor, 'full-body plate armor', is generally above 100 yuan, even if the freight is added, after shipping to Malacca, it is cheaper than the full-body steel plate armor hand-made by Portuguese craftsmen.

Moreover, this kind of plate armor is made of all-steel, and the thickest part, that is, the chest part, is only about three millimeters, and the thickness of most parts is only about two millimeters.

However, because of the excellent quality of the steel, the defensive capability of these three millimeters of steel is comparable to that of the four millimeters or even five millimeters thick plate armor produced by the Europeans at the same time.

Because the thickness is relatively thin, this also makes the export plate armor produced by Datang much lighter.

Light weight and excellent defense capabilities, even if it is expensive, it also makes the plate armor produced by Datang sell well all over the world, and even the Portuguese and Spaniards are purchased and equipped on a large scale.

The plate armor produced by the Tang Dynasty has always been popular with the natives of Fusang, Nanyang, India, West Asia and other regions, even if they can't afford to buy full-body plate armor, they will buy half-body armor or cuirass.

Today's plate armor industry in the Tang Empire has developed quite maturely, and there are more than ten types of export-oriented plate armor, and even the styles of customization are acceptable, of course, this kind of customization will not increase the defense capability of the plate armor, but only a change in style, because the Tang military needs to ensure that its own weapons can penetrate these plate armor that has been exported in large quantities.

And this breakdown standard is whether the 14mm flintlock pistol equipped by the Datang Army in batches can penetrate at 50 meters or not!

If it can be penetrated, then it will be exported, and if it cannot penetrate, it will not be exported.

After all, the Datang military was also afraid of fighting with a certain indigenous in the future, so a group of indigenous troops wearing steel cans ran out from the opposite side, but their main rifles could not penetrate them at medium distances.

Of course, even if it does, in fact, there is no big problem, if you want to be able to block the 14mm flintlock pistol of the Datang Army within 50 meters, even if you use high-quality steel produced by Datang, you have to do it more than 6 mm!

And this kind of six-millimeter-thick plate armor is too heavy, even the Datang Army itself is rarely equipped, even if it is equipped, it is also equipped in the mode of heavy cuirass, generally speaking, the heavy plate armor of the Datang Army, its thickness is generally four millimeters, and there are a large number of two-millimeter light plate armor.

Why not equip thicker plate armor?

Because even if it is six or seven millimeters thick, it is useless for the era of guns.

Don't underestimate the muskets of these years, although the accuracy is not very good, and sometimes they are dumb fire, but the power is actually not small.

What's more, whether it is the Tang Army, the Spanish, Portuguese or even the Ottomans, they are all armed with heavy muskets!

In order to fight against plate armor, heavy muskets have become popular in Western countries, what is called heavy muskets, generally about 20 mm caliber muskets.

The Datang Army has also successively developed and successively tested and equipped with 17 mm, 18 mm, 19 mm, 20 mm, 22 mm and other heavy muskets of various calibers.

This 18-millimeter flintlock pistol, known as the fifteen-year rifle, uses the latest type, with the most scientific proportion of black propellant, and the barrel is longer, so its power is enough to penetrate the eight-millimeter-thick plate armor at a distance of 100 meters, which is still the high-quality steel produced by Datang itself.

In other words, in the contemporary environment, there is no plate armor that can block the fifteen-year-old rifle, not even a hundred meters away, nor the plate armor equipped by the Tang Army itself.

The development of plate armor has come to an end, which is why although almost the entire army of the Tang Army has popularized plate armor, it is still light cuirass that is the most equipped.

And even so, many military generals have already called for the abolition of the cuirass of ordinary infantry, if it is for this point of protection that has no actual combat value, it is better to reduce the combat burden of soldiers to strengthen the soldiers' battlefield mobility ability.

Now many military generals think: it is better to run fast than to wear thick!

Therefore, in fact, the plate armor in the Tang Dynasty military is already in a very embarrassing situation, you want to say that it is useless, the effect of resisting cold weapons such as bows and arrows is still huge.

But if you want to say that it is useful, it is not of much strategic value when encountering enemies that use guns, especially the Portuguese, Spanish, and Ottoman enemies who use heavy muskets on a large scale.

However, this is only the view of plate armor within the Tang Army, and does not represent the view of the armies of various countries around the world on plate armor, and now plate armor is still a weapon with strategic value in the world.

It has to be mentioned that when the Tang Empire began to sell their export-type plate armor to the world, it also stimulated the promotion and application of plate armor on a global scale to a certain extent.

Maybe in the original time and space, the plate armor was only easier to see on the Western battlefield, but now, you can see the Tang plate armor in the battle between the daimyo in Fusang, and you can also see them in various parts of the South Seas, such as the battlefield in Annam, and you can also see the figure of the Tang plate armor in India and even West Asia and North Africa.

Even in Europe, there is also Datang plate armor, and there are quite a few of them, because whether it is the Portuguese or the Spaniards, they have purchased Datang plate armor on a large scale many times and shipped it back to Europe, equipping their native troops, and selling it to many other European countries.

To put it mildly, Datang plate armor is one of the best-selling among many industrial products of Datang, and there are no geographical limitations, whether it is a barbarian indigenous tribe, or a slightly civilized country such as the Portuguese and Spain, or the Safavid Dynasty or even the Tatars, they all show a great thirst for Datang plate armor!

The biggest reason for the best-selling Datang plate armor in the world is its high quality and low price, and it is a high quality and low price that others cannot imitate.

The Portuguese were able to produce their own plates, but their own plates were more expensive, and the plates they produced by hand were less protective at the same weight.

The same situation is still cotton!

The textile industry is currently the leading industry in the field of light industry in the Tang Empire, and a large number of cotton fabrics are not only sold well in China, but also exported in large quantities!

And cotton cloth is a basic daily necessities, and many places have the ability to produce themselves, but why can Datang's cotton cloth appear in all parts of East Asia, in the Western Regions and Central Asia, in India, in West Asia, Africa and even Europe with merchant ships.

Relying on low-price dumping

How did the Tang Western Trading Company open up the cotton cloth market in India, and make India the largest export market for imperial cotton cloth today, it is very simple, with a price so low that the locals can't refuse!

They dump a large amount of low-price goods at half or even cheaper prices than the local cloth price, and engage in completely unreasonable malicious competition.

In the face of this low-price dumping strategy, the local cloth industry was simply unable to resist, and in the end most of them hoped for political intervention.

But what type of company is Datang Western Trading Company? You think that people are well-behaved trading companies, they will only do business, and if they are bullied outside, they can only go home crying, at most they will find the Datang military father to be angry!

Joke!

They're a colonial corporation with armed forces!

If the local indigenous princes dare to obstruct normal trade by political means, the Datang Western Trading Company will not hesitate to send troops to attack, and many times, the Datang Western Trading Company is happy to do so, because fighting these indigenous princes and making war profits can be equated.

After all, fighting a war to grab money is much faster and cooler than making money in business!