Chapter 20: with translation of chapter title

In the meeting room, Factory Director Wang widened his eyes and exclaimed, "You are… the Capital's equipment representative Zhao?"

"Well, it's me, Comrade Qin Miao. You've rendered great service to the troops! On behalf of the troops and the General Armament Department, I thank you!" Zhao representative warmly shook Qin Miao's hand: "I'll write a report upward; at least it'll be a second-class merit, possibly even a first-class one."

A first-class merit is normally only awarded to martyrs! Factory Director Wang looked at Qin Miao with a complex expression, "This bookworm in our factory—how could he be so capable? The Niu family… truly foolish!"

"Zhao representative, you're too kind. This achievement is the result of hard work by all teachers and students at Ha Gong Da; I personally merely contributed a little. Professor Yuan and his team did a lot of work to increase the artillery range—without the CNC machine tools they developed, I couldn't have processed anything! And Director Lu, if he hadn't called me over, I wouldn't have had a chance to perform."

Everyone lifts the flowery sedan!

Qin Miao felt that his statement should be considered fairly perfect, right?

Wait, Zhao representative, why won't you let go of my hand?

"Comrade Qin Miao, let's hurry; we still have an important task ahead."

"Cough cough, Zhao representative, let me say a few more words to my father…"

Wait, why are my feet off the ground?

Zhao representative grabbed one of Qin Miao's arms, the soldier he brought grabbed the other, and with a combined lift, Qin Miao's feet left the ground!

"Come on, let's go, we're busy! Comrade Lao Qin, thank you for cultivating such an outstanding talent as Qin Miao for the army!"

The faces of those present darkened slightly. What does this mean? Are they trying to poach talent from our Ha Gong Da? No, absolutely not—Qin Miao is too capable; he needs to stay at Ha Gong Da for four years, as many projects require him!

Experimental workshop.

The dot-matrix printer made a "da-da-da" sound as Qin Miao output the data from the computer onto the printer.

Finally, the printing finished.

"Xiao Wang, quickly, immediately send these materials to Factory 724, have them produce a batch of shells according to the data above, then determine the firing tables through test firing…"

"Wait," Qin Miao said, "determining the firing tables via test firing—wouldn't that require firing hundreds of shells?"

"At least two thousand rounds are needed," Zhao representative said. "Different elevation angles and temperatures require test firings; later we must also add crosswind corrections and shell bore wear corrections, etc. But no matter how many shells we fire, we must get this right—on the front lines, friend and foe intermingle, and if the firing tables are wrong, we could end up hitting our own positions."

At close range, direct aiming suffices, but for indirect-fire weapons beyond ten or so kilometers, firing tables are essential.

This is a dense table divided into basic elements, correction elements, and dispersion elements. The front part lists various data under standard conditions, including launch angle, range, trajectory, impact angle, impact speed, flight time, etc.

The latter two sections are various complex corrections.

Artillerymen must be able to read this firing table, even memorize it, so that when firing, they can act with added effectiveness.

But where does this firing table come from?

Naturally, it's derived from firing shell after shell!

Two thousand rounds, at two hundred yuan each, that's four hundred thousand! Add the wear on the howitzers, and it gets even more expensive—not to mention the huge amount of time required… can the frontline soldiers wait?

"Exactly, Zhao representative is right!" Just then, another voice came from outside: "No matter how many shells we fire, we must quickly finish compiling the firing tables for the new shells!"

Whoosh, a large group of officers walked in.

A red star on the head, revolutionary red flags on both sides— in this era, uniforms lacked rank insignia, making it hard to distinguish leaders from soldiers. Cough cough, back then it was meant to show equality between officers and enlisted, but once on the battlefield, when a superior fell, no one knew whom to obey.

However, after a decade or so, some ways to tell them apart emerged—for instance, officers tended to have a stern bearing and were often plumper, so there used to be orderlies who deliberately marched with a square step to receive other soldiers' salutes.

Nowadays, you can tell at a glance that someone is an officer, even a high-ranking one! Their aura is wolfish and tigerish— the mark of having commanded tens of thousands.

"I heard Ha Gong Da has a new shell whose test firing range exceeded nineteen kilometers—this is a big deal! The news reached headquarters, and we immediately decided to suspend the meeting and come see for ourselves. We first went to the range, watched the test-fired shells, then hurried over, hearing it was a young man… that must be you, right? Good, the future of the motherland rests in your hands!"

A strong big hand patted Qin Miao's shoulder; he looked at the slightly thin officer before him and felt moved.

Elder Yuan, born in 1924, joined the New Fourth Army in 1941, participated in multiple campaigns, joined the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea in 1952, and is now the person in charge of the 23rd Army and deputy commander of the military region!

I never expected that such a shell would blast out even a bigwig of this level—cough cough cough…

"Yes!" Qin Miao straightened his chest; in front of such an elder, he must perform well.

"Elder Yuan, you've come at just the right time! With time pressing, we hope to coordinate more howitzers so we can quickly finish compiling the firing tables." Zhao representative said.

"Cough cough, Zhao representative, different howitzers have different wear, so compiling the firing tables might introduce errors."

"That's right, there will be error, and we can only…"

"Pull out a batch of our newest howitzers for test firing—brand new, most accurate!" Elder Yuan waved his hand.

"Cough cough, leaders, I have a simple method that can quickly and efficiently compute the firing tables…"

Compute!

Everyone widened their eyes.

"How do we compute it?" Zhao representative said, breathing rapidly.

"We establish a ballistic model in the computer, including the effects of air resistance on the projectile's shape and gravity, etc.; then we use numerical analysis, such as the Runge-Kutta method, to convert differential equations into difference equations, then iterate to obtain a numerical solution. We have already test-fired once; with this correction, we should be able to compile the firing table, and then verify any deviation through actual shooting."

We don't need two thousand shells; just a dozen or so will suffice to verify whether the firing table is correct!

The key is speed!

Once the shells are produced, we'll test‑fire a few, verify they're fine, and then send them to the southern front! Within a week, the southern troops will be able to use the new shells!

"Good, as long as you can compute it, I'll request merit for you in the name of the military region!" Elder Yuan's face lit up with excitement: "How long will the calculation take? Is a week enough?"

"Cough cough, a few hours should do it— … but I'd like to eat something first…"

All this running around has made me hungry!

"Get a box of military canned food from the vehicle!" Elder Yuan waved his hand: "After we finish the firing‑table calculation, tonight we'll go to Ha Cheng's biggest restaurant and have a feast!"