Chapter 60 (2/2)

With speed control, it was now possible to let the steam engine II take over some of the more sophisticated processing tasks.

The gears produced by the blacksmiths were delivered and neatly placed in a corner of the shed.

Looking at them with the perspective of an industrial production line, none of these gears could be called qualified to work with and all of them would be thrown into the defective box, waiting to be recycled. But in terms of this age, they were rare works of art – the design of involute gears were created with a sense of harmony. The gears that had been immersed in lard emitted a unique metallic sheen.

In addition to produced gears, carpenters who were responsible for the planning had already built the foundation as well as other parts that were already prepared. He let the door guards call for Anna so that they could begin to assemble the first steam-powered borer together.

They began Roland’s plan, which he thought was the most effective plan to mass-produce rifles.

Relying only on blacksmiths who had to manually knock out a barrel was extremely time-consuming, but also very boring for the blacksmiths themselves. Now, he only had to take out an iron bar and he could directly drill the barrel out with the borer. So in one day, he would be able to produce more than ten barrels.

At the same time, by replacing the head, the boring machine couldn’t only be used to cut but also to engrave the rifling. With rifled flintlocks, the firing accuracy would be further improved.

Thus, he was confident that before the end of winter, the two groups of militia, nearly 300 people, could all be armed with rifles.

However, Roland couldn’t guarantee that his army would be able to calmly load, aim, and shoot at their targets in the face of charging knights. It was more realistic to think that they would rather drop their weapons, turn tail, and run away. After all, the training time of the two troops were too short, they had no combat experience against other humans.

So, he had to bring out a more powerful weapon onto the battlefield, a weapon which could defeat the enemy even before they could start their own assault.

That was artillery.

As the God of War in the history of human warfare, the destruction and deterrence brought by artillery wasn’t reproducible by guns. A six-pound field artillery had the range to attack the other side before they were even able to gather. The mixed-up armies of this era would surely be unable to maintain discipline in combat while being under constant fire. As long as he could get three or four field guns, his enemy would never have the chance to charge.

Roland was following a step-by-step plan – with his manual milling machines, which could be used to process usable steering gear, he would be able to produce the speed-controllable steam engine II, and with this machine he could create his own borer. With steam boring, he would be able to process a variety of gun barrels and cannon barrels.

There was still at least two months until the end of the Months of the Demons, so as long as his plans played out smoothly, Border Town’s militia would have the power to compete with the Duke in a full out battle.

TN: Information about Bamboo Dragonflies