Drilling Cannons, Light Armor Musketeers Suited to Otherworld Conditions

The production of smoothbore guns was underway, and so was the production of cannons.

Lynn proposed several manufacturing methods and provided a direction. Once they had a direction, making them became much easier.

Steel construction and bronze construction.

Drilling could be used to make guns, and it had to be tried for cannons as well.

Drilled construction.

Cast construction.

They should use every method they could think of—for example, what kind of molds to use during casting.

Drilling a cannon was not like drilling a gun barrel. Gun barrels could be made through brute force that worked miracles; they were easy enough to drill anyway.

Cannon drilling could only rely on a water-powered boring machine. During winter, they could only rely on Magic Beasts to do the work. Lynn grumbled about that, then figured the electric arc blast furnace was not smelting steel every day anyway, so he borrowed the Magic Tower's magic. At the same time, he briefly studied the construction of Magic Puppets and turned it into a Magic Engine.

Magic Industry had especially severe limitations. First, magic could only be generated by living creatures. Then it needed transmission lines, enormous Magic Storage Towers had to be built to siphon the magic from trees day and night, and citizens' magic had to be drawn as well. Every activation also required adding a little blood, allowing the magic to transmit more effectively.

The technical difficulties involved were quite challenging—for example, how to preserve blood while retaining its ability to store magic, and how to process blood so it could transmit magic faster.

A primitive Steam Engine had also been built, but it leaked steam badly, so they had people continue improving it.

In the end, they settled on these cannon types.

Steel Cannons took longer to make, while casting required an Electric Arc Furnace to smelt the steel.

Fortunately, multiple cannons could be cast at once.

Drilling took a long time—roughly six to eight weeks, around two months.

Bronze Cannons did not require an Electric Arc Furnace, saving the magic stored in the Magic Storage Tower. At present, though, one Electric Arc Furnace was already enough. A single ten-ton batch of steel could directly make around three thousand guns.

Bronze Cannons could be made quickly, and they deformed excellently under high pressure, with good ductility. (When overpressured, they expanded and deformed first, reducing the chance of an instantaneous explosion.)

They were quick to make and corrosion-resistant.

Steel Cannons were not corrosion-resistant, and their ductility was poor.

In terms of power and performance, steel won completely—provided the Steel Cannon met standards. In reality, Bronze Cannons had a higher pass rate. If cast using Lost Wax Casting, one-piece Bronze Cannons were better and relatively simple to make.

But once drilling was used for production, Steel Cannons won completely.

After brutal testing, Lynn still chose Steel Cannons.

First, the cannon Lynn was building was a Field Cannon, meant for rapid mobility.

Lynn used the 12-pounder Cannon as a reference. A Bronze Cannon's gun barrel weighed around 550 kilograms, while one made directly from steel would weigh around 490 kilograms. But steel was stronger, allowing for a greater Charge Amount and thus a longer range.

A Steel Cannon's maximum range could reach 2,500 to 2,800 meters, while a Bronze Cannon could only reach 1,500 to 1,800 meters.

A Steel Cannon still retained accuracy after 500 rounds, while a Bronze Cannon lost its accuracy after 300.

In practice, a Steel Cannon's lifespan was 500 to 800 Rounds, while a Bronze Cannon's was 300 to 500 Rounds.

Because of the brutal experiments, the cannons had basically all been scrapped. The next batch would have to wait another month and a half.

Originally, the Field Cannon data in Lynn's mind called for a weight of one ton—more than a thousand kilograms.

But after actually making one, he found that a Muzzle-loading smoothbore cannon from the Smoothbore Gun era did not need to weigh that much at all. For instance, the gun barrel could use steel, while the wheels and carriage could all be made of wood. Only for the wheels, considering lifespan and weight reduction, did Lynn use Slime and steel.

The cannon body alone did not need nearly that much. The theoretical calculation was 450 kilograms, but to be safe, they used 490 kilograms—60 kilograms lighter than the 550-kilogram Bronze Cannon.

Including the wheels and Gun carriage, it still came to around one thousand kilograms, but those parts could be made of wood.

Since a type had been selected during the first test, they only needed to follow that template for future production.

As for other cannons, there was no time, and Lynn believed war should be fought as a war of maneuver, so he did not want any other types.

Lynn had also considered making smaller 6-pounder Cannons and 3-pounder Cannons, but after looking at Otherworld Superhumans and Otherworld Magic Beasts, he immediately felt there was no need.

Lynn had originally thought Pull-tube technology could not possibly succeed, because according to his memories, it might require materials used for Percussion Caps.

The result was that they could simply fill it with gunpowder, then use a Flintlock Firing Mechanism to combine it with the powder. With proper sealing on the outside to ensure safety, it could even be fired in the rain.

Of course, Lynn also considered using Magic Guidance Materials as a substitute. For instance, they could make a small Rune Wand and have the user inject magic into it to activate it and create flame.

The result was entirely viable. If it were made from durable materials, such as using steel for the casing, they could ensure the wand would not be damaged.

This gave Lynn, who lacked primers, a new idea. But this method was too expensive. If technology advanced in the future, Needle-fire Rifles might appear—for example, breech-loading single-shot rifles in which a Steel Needle pierced a paper cartridge.