C844 Voltaire Shipyard

The earliest Iron-armored battleship s were actually not that rare. In the ancient times, the navy already had their wooden hull covered with iron armor, but in the Three Kingdoms, they had already installed iron shields on the outer layer of their ships to prevent the enemy from using rockets and catapults.

In order to defeat Shi Shan's wish temple in Japan, Zhi Tianxinchang specially made an iron armored ship. In reality, it was just a large residential ship with a metal plate on the outside. In the end, they won a great victory against the Maori's house's army in the Inner Sea and finally seized the famous city, Stone Mountain Temple.

In fact, North Korea had also researched their own Armored Boat. Li Shunchen's Turtle Ship was actually a Primordial Armored Ship, and the Japanese had suffered a great loss in front of it. Don't think that the name of the Turtle Ship sounded bad.

These Middle Age's so-called Iron-armored Ship were obviously not what Xiao Letian wanted, and 19 mid-century leaf's Europeans relied on the sail battleship's design line of thought, creating a batch of Iron-armored Ship s that were not what Xiao Letian wanted either.

In 1858, the French made the world's first Iron-armored Ship, with a discharge of 5630 tons. However, this was still a battleship made out of iron and wood, it was not a pure Iron-armored Ship.

This time, he could be considered to have given up on the wood in the metal plate. However, the sail was still there, and the cannons were arranged in the same way as the previous sail battleship, with a row on the left and a row on the right.

As for the American Civil War, although this was the first time the Iron-armored Ship were used in actual combat, the shapes of the two Iron-armored Ship were too weird. They could only shoot at each other in the river, completely unable to enter the ocean.

In Xiao Letian's eyes, the true origin of Iron-armored Ship should still be pushed forward by another thirty years. Only at the early twentieth century would it truly be the era of Iron-armored Ship.

The pure steam power could give up on the sail, the main cannon's central axis could be aligned and it could freely spin the cannon emplacement, completely giving up on the musket … This type of Iron Armor Sea Beast was the Overlord of the Seas in Xiao Letian's eyes.

What was displayed in the Voltaire Shipyard today was a top-secret plan jointly led by Xiao Letian and Prince Karl. It was a very bold attempt.

The Voltaire Shipyard was situated on the shore of the Oder River, in Shechern, close to the mouth of the sea. To the north was the Baltic Sea. The shipyard had deliberately invested in a huge dry dock for secrecy, and had built a huge shelf of wooden shelves and cloth. Engineers and workers who could enter were all highly reliable people who had been strictly selected by the Prussians.

When King Yi's carriage entered the shipyard, Fang Guan and the others just realised that a golden-painted carriage was parked in front of the office building. They were all very familiar with this carriage, it was the carriage of Prince Karl.

"The prince has already arrived. Be careful of your appearance and appearance …" The King Yi warned everyone, but these words were useless against Fang Guan. Inside the living room, Prince Karl just picked up a cup of coffee and Fang Guan threw himself over with a loud shout.

"Godfather …" Fang Guan stirred up a gust of wind, and directly threw himself into Prince Karl's embrace. In order to avoid Fang Guan's white dress, Karl spilled all the coffee on his pants.

"Oh, you are so naughty! "I really should find you a powerful prince to deal with you …"

"No …" "I don't need a prince, all of you know how to fight, just like a combative rooster …"

"Haha, then who do you like? And you even clicked on the French intelligence officer? " Karl laughed.

Fang Guan shrugged his shoulders and said indifferently, "I only gave him a chance to pursue me. What comes after will depend on his ability …"

Karl rubbed Fang Guan's hair, stood up and apologetically said to the King Yi: "I'm very sorry, I'll go change clothes …"

A while later, Prince Karl walked out after changing into a clean set of clothes. At this time, all the foreign students followed suit and greeted the prince, and after exchanging some greetings, King Yi said, "Your Highness' mental state and appearance is not bad, seems like there is nothing wrong with your throat!"

"Yes, I really need to thank my dear Xiao. The doctor said that my lesions were found very timely, if I were a few years later I would have been in danger …" "God bless him, why should he be a prophet?"

"Maybe this is Brother Xiao's charm. If he doesn't have some mysterious methods, how would he be able to design such a strange battleship?" The King Yi laughed.

"That's right, I have invited many Military experts s to study it together. They all agree that this type of battleship will completely create a new sea battle strategy, maybe we will really reach the frontlines of this era. Although it's not perfect, I am personally willing to take this risk …"

The King Yi shook his head: "Prince is wrong, the risk this time is something our Ryukyu can only take on. Earlier, we allocated 900 thousand silver taels for scientific research and construction of this dry dock as well as a large amount of equipment. Later, we also invested 1 million silver taels for the construction of the ship body.

"No, no, no, my lord, don't do it like that, I think Xiao Letian wouldn't do it like that. In order to provide the design and construction engineer for the battleship, Prussia stopped the construction plan of two battleships right after. Even our brave spies have lost more than 10, and these are all costs! "

The two of them looked each other in the eye and laughed. Politicians always try their best to probe each other out, but quarrelling with red faces is out of the question.

"Of course we won't forget Prussia's offer of support. However, if it wasn't for Brother Xiao's blueprint, even the genius designers wouldn't have been able to come up with such a strange battleship …"

"That's right, I admit that. Xiao Letian's way of thinking for design is priceless, if this line of thinking is proven in actual combat, then I think our two countries will be 30 years ahead of this era."

"Oh, that's good …" "Money is only valuable if you spend it. We Chinese are not misers. Although 1.9 million is very painful for me, but I don't think the cost will be that high in the future, right?"

Karl extended his hand and invited them in. "Let's talk while we walk, a construction price of 1.9 million silver is indeed expensive, a British ship, Victoria, launched in 1859 costs 150578 pounds, the normal discharge capacity is 6959 tons, this is the normal cost of a wood shell sail battleship …"

"And the Iron-armored Ship warriors who entered the water in 1861 cost 377,392 pounds, the normal discharge was 9137 tons, the cost had more than doubled. One can see that the Iron-armored battleship itself was a toy for burning money, only powerful countries can't play with it!"

They all walked towards the closed dry dock from the office building. Along the way, they were met with elites from Prussian soldier, and King Yi even saw a few familiar faces. There was a group of Prussians who fought together with Xiao Letian during the bloody battle on the stone bridge, but a lot of them were transferred here today.

"According to our previous budget, even if Xiao Letian's battleship is extremely strange, its construction price should not be more than one fold higher than the Warrior's Boat. 1.9 million taels of silver is equivalent to a full 630 thousand pounds, which is indeed very high …"

"But, the cost isn't calculated like that. The cannon and barrel performance that Xiao Letian requested is something that none of the Steel plant in Europe can produce right now, and the strength is simply not enough, we need to gather a lot of scientists to research and match it with new steel. Also, we need to gather a lot of scientists to study the appearance of the battleship.

"The most important thing is the crew, Xiao Letian wants the cruiser, so we have to take into account the multiple considerations of speed and reliability. The entire design work is completely beyond our imagination … That's right, isn't the beautiful Miss Cai Bixia following the design team to observe and study? "I think she should be aware of the complexity of this battleship's craftsmanship …"

When King Yi and the rest entered the dock, everyone inhaled a breath of cold air. The monster in front of them had completely exceeded their expectations.