Although the Daming Navy has two fleet headquarters at the group army level, there are no fixed ships under the two fleet commands, but they are increased or decreased at any time according to the needs of combat missions. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 The entire Ming Navy, at this time, was also known as the "Ten Ten Fleet", which means the main fleet composed of ten ironclad ships and ten armored cruisers.

Among them, the ten ironclad ships are all named after the years of the emperors of the Ming Dynasty, and the capital ships with the largest tonnage are the three "Emperor class" with an unladen displacement of 11,000 tons (metric tons), namely "Hongwu" (also known as Hongwu Emperor), "Guangfu", and "Yongle".

These three Emperor-class ships are currently the newest ironclad ships in the world, and they were all completed and delivered to the Ming Navy in 1874. Since it is the latest ironclad ship, it naturally adopts many new technologies that are different. First of all, the turret of the ironclad ship adopts a rotatable fully enclosed armored turret arranged on the central axis.

However, in order to adopt this new design, the main guns of the Emperor-class ironclad ships were smaller in caliber than those of the British and French capital ships of the same class, and only two 320 mm twin-mounted main guns of 38 times the diameter were installed - of course, they were retractable breech-loading rifled guns. In addition, the Emperor-class capital ship also has 12 130mm secondary guns and 12 20mm machine guns, and the auxiliary firepower is very powerful.

As for the armor of the Great Emperor class, of course, it is very thick! The thickness of the waterline armor belt on its side was probably 620mm thicker than that of any later battleship! However, it is not the all-steel armor of later generations, but a layer of steel-faced iron armor, a layer of teak, a layer of steel-faced iron armor, a layer of teak, and finally a layer of all-steel hull composite armor, which was jokingly called "sandwich armor" by shipbuilding engineers of this era. Of course, its protective capabilities cannot be compared with the Harvey armor and Krupp hardened armor of later generations - our Emperor Zhu did not study metallurgy. I don't know how to do this.

But the 620mm steel-faced iron armor and teak protection have made the Emperor class the strongest capital ship in the world right now. However, the next class of capital ships of 15,000 tons is being designed. The design of all-steel iron armor will be adopted - steel iron armor is poured with liquid wrought iron with low carbon content on the prepared steel plate, and the molten iron can be condensed; Another method is to weld the steel plate and the wrought iron plate together, inject liquid steel at the interface between the two, and weld them together when they are condensed. A steel iron armor with a thickness of 1 can exert the same defensive effect as a 1.25 thick wrought iron armor.

In addition, the three Emperor classes have adopted the "key protection" armor box design, that is, the strongest protection is concentrated in the central part of the hull to form an armored box. There was not only waterline armor, but also horizontal armor of a certain thickness, like an armored box. At the same time, it is also necessary to ensure that the armor box has a certain volume, as long as the armor box does not leak, even if the end is broken, the waterline will not overflow the upper cover of the armor box, that is, it will never sink, unless the armor box is broken, or a few torpedoes are hit under the waterline...... The torpedo had of course been invented, and it was the British engineer Robert Brown. Developed by Whitehead in 1866. However, the torpedo at this time had a speed of less than 10 knots. The maximum range is only a few hundred meters, and it can only be used at close range. Little role in the decisive battle of the fleet.

The power system of the three Emperor-class ships is also very powerful, using two latest three-cylinder vertical three-expansion steam engines with two-shaft drive. The maximum power can reach 9000 indication horsepower, which allows the Emperor class to reach a maximum speed of 15.5 knots. The ship's coal bunkers can carry up to 1,500 tons of coal, with a maximum range of 4,800 nautical miles/10 knots.

In addition to the 3 powerful Emperor class, the Ming Navy also has another 7 smaller tonnage "Emperor class", which is also named after the era of the emperors of the Ming Dynasty, but it is not the kind of emperor who is very outstanding, so it cannot be called "Emperor". Of course, these 7 Emperor-class ironclad ships are of the same level, but because of the large difference in the start time, there is a process of continuous improvement, and the parameters are not exactly the same.

Among them, the lead ship "Hongxi" has an unladen displacement of 9,000 tons, a waterline armor thickness of 510mm (wrought iron sandwich armor), two twin 305mm caliber main guns, a rotatable roofless armored turret, and the configuration of the secondary guns is the same as that of the Emperor class. It is powered by two reciprocating steam engines with a maximum indicated power of 7,000 horsepower, a maximum speed of 14 knots, and a maximum cruising range of 4,800 nautical miles / 10 knots.

Construction began in 1867, and the design of the main fleet of this class was a non-royal consortium of United Shipbuilding Companies, because many of the latest design concepts at the time (some of which were proposed by Zhu Jishi, such as the optional turret arranged on the central axis), so the construction period was as long as 4 years, and it was not completed until 1871.

At the same time, the first 10,000-ton ironclad ship "Zhonghua" designed by the Jiangnan Factory was built in 1868, followed by one in 1869, one in 1870 and one in 1871. However, when the "Hongxi" was delivered to the Navy, the Admiralty quickly canceled all orders for the "Zhonghua" class and asked the Jiangnan Plant to participate in the improvement and construction of the "Emperor" class. And in one fell swoop, an order was placed for 6 emperor-class ships. The four "Zhonghua" class ships that have already been delivered to the Navy will be withdrawn from the first-line fleet in stages. One of them was converted into a training ship, two became a cruiser, and one was sold to the Mexican Navy as the ironclad ship "Mexico". And the Emperor class is actually an improved version of the emperor level, which is a design taken out by Jiangnan Factory.

At present, the domestic market for large military ships in Daming has formed a situation of competition between Jiangnan Shipyard (owned by Nanyang Bank) and United Shipbuilding Company. The next generation of 15,000-ton capital ships was tendered by four shipbuilding companies at the same time - in the past 10 years, with the acceleration of Daming's industrialization, competition in various industries has begun to become fierce. Many small factories that were originally insignificant have grown into large factories like giants. For example, the shipbuilding industry is now dominated by four major shipbuilding giants, including Nanyang Shipbuilding Group, United Shipbuilding Company, Guangdong Shipbuilding Company (formed by the merger of a number of small shipyards in Guangdong), and Beiyang Shipbuilding Company.

The share of the largest Nanyang Company in the Daming shipbuilding market (more than 300 tons) has fallen to less than 40%, but the position of the world's largest shipbuilding company is as solid as a rock. Once the world's largest market is developed, the impetus for industrialization is truly unparalleled, at least in terms of scale.

In addition to the ten ironclad ships, the Daming Navy also has ten armored cruisers with good combat effectiveness, which belong to four different models and are designed and manufactured by the four major shipbuilding groups. Among them, the Nanyang Hong Kong Shipyard built three "Guangdong" class (now the naming of ships of the Ming Navy has become standardized, the capital ship is the emperor's year name or the name of the country, the armored cruiser is the province of the Ming Dynasty, and the light cruiser is the name of the government), two "Liaoning" class ships built by the United Shipbuilding Company, two "Shandong" class ships built by the Guangdong Shipbuilding Company and two "Henan" class ships built by the Beiyang Shipbuilding Company.

However, the differences in parameters between the four models of armored cruisers are not too great, and the unladen displacement is between 4000 and 4300 tons. It is powered by two three-expansion reciprocating steam engines with twin shaft propulsion and a power of between 5,500 hp and 6,000 hp. The maximum speed is more than 15.5 knots, less than 16 knots.

The main guns are two 240mm twin rotatable armored turrets (without caps), also deployed on a central axis. In addition, it has four 105mm secondary guns, six 20mm cannons and four 360mm torpedo tubes, and is equipped with a modified version of the British white-headed torpedo.

The waterline armor of these four models of armored cruisers is between 280mm and 140mm (all wrought iron sandwiches), and the deck armor is a uniform 75mm. Among cruisers, such tonnage and armor can be said to be second to none.

However, all these ironclad ships and armored cruisers are products of peacetime, and whether they are good or not still needs to be tested by actual combat. And now, the first test may be coming soon. (To be continued.) )