According to the British inference, the "orca" has been chasing a flying shear ship at full speed for most of the day. During this process, the "Orca" steam engine must be in a state of heavy load operation. The British don't know the level of the French steam engine, but they would not be better than the British. After all, Britain is the hometown of steam engines.

If the steam engine on a British ship continues to operate at a high load for such a long time, I am afraid that there will be a certain probability of failure. So they decided that as long as they speed up the pursuit, they will be able to catch up and destroy the French steam cruiser.

"It would be great if we could capture this warship. After all, it also has something stronger than us. It is worth learning. For example, it does not have paddle wheels. One major weakness is missing." The "trembling" at the front of the chasing formation. On the steam frigate, commander Lieutenant Colonel Neville thought.

After the "Orca" finished its turn, it began to accelerate hard, but it did not accelerate quickly. The distance between the two sides continues to approach.

Indeed, only in terms of the level of steam engine, the steam engine on the Equality is not more advanced and powerful than the steam engine on the British ship. But as far as the propulsion method is concerned, the propeller's propulsion efficiency far exceeds that of the paddle wheel. Coupled with another bulbous bow that is hidden under the water and cannot be seen under normal circumstances, the resistance that "Equality" needs to overcome when reaching a considerable speed is significantly smaller than that of the British steamship. . The combination of these two makes it unnecessary to run the steam engine at full capacity when the Equality reaches a speed of about eleven knots.

Therefore, whether it is a race sprint or a race long-distance race, the Equality is much superior to the British steamships he faces. In fact, if you just want to get rid of the pursuit of the British, Major Marten only needs to let the Equality continue to accelerate. It won't take long for him to throw the British away.

However, Major Malten did not want to do this. Because he knew that after his first attack had achieved good results, several shipyards under the military-industrial complex were preparing to switch to this type of warship. Maybe it won’t take long for the second and third warships to be launched.

Marten knew that by then, it would be more difficult to regain the record. When there are too many wolves and too little meat-when will I become a general? You know, General Napoleon Bonaparte is one year younger than himself, and he has become the first in power!

So Marten secretly made up his mind to play a big game, so that the British would never forget him and his boat in this life.

But Marten didn't dare to rush directly to fight the British. The British had more ships and more artillery. But the British ships have obvious weaknesses. Their paddle wheels are so big, so important, and so vulnerable. As long as it hits a few shells on the paddle wheel in battle, it can lose its ability to sail. If Marten was an Englishman, maybe he might really yell at him. But who made him French?

Over the years, when the French navy faced the British navy, apart from the battle in the North American continent, it won because of the British's own command errors. The rest was basically the history of being beaten by the British. . Therefore, the French navy is always very guilty when facing the British navy. Basically, if there is no force that overwhelms the superiority, it is afraid to attack actively.

For example, in the original history, the combined fleet of France and Spain had a slight advantage over Nelson's fleet in terms of strength. The reason why they were hoisted up and beaten by Nelson in Trafalgar, and the exchange ratio they played was completely disproportionate. One big reason was that the French and Spanish navies had their first thought after seeing the British fleet: "Run quickly. !" The second thought was: "You must run faster than the Spanish (French)!"

Not only wanted to kill these British ships so that he could become a general, but also was quite jealous of the Royal Navy, so Marten chose the trivial style of play: drag the British to run first.

Marten had been on a British steamship and knew that around eleven knots was their limit. At this limit speed, they would have to lower the pressure of the steam engine to avoid malfunctions, or, if not certain Can't move. At that time, he can take advantage of the opportunity to rob.

But Maarten soon discovered that he didn’t need to wait until night at all. At about four o’clock in the afternoon, a dark cloud drifted over from the west. The wind on the sea began to increase, and the waves also increased. The paddle steamers suddenly I can't keep up with him.

On the shaky sea, the paddle wheels of the British steam frigate, as the hull swayed, were sometimes completely submerged in the water and sometimes completely exposed to the surface, and the propulsion efficiency was greatly reduced. Their speed also dropped rapidly, even to the point where they were not as good as ordinary sailboats.

"Damn it! Now let the Frenchman run away again! This **** wind!" Lieutenant Colonel Neville gave a vicious punch to the ship's side. Before that, they had chased a place not far from the enemy ship, and if they chased it a little closer, they could use the 24-pounder gun on the bow to fire at the target. But now, they obviously can't catch up with the "Orca".

"Lieutenant Colonel, enemy ship, enemy ship is turning!" At this moment, the voice of the watchman suddenly came from his ear.

Lieutenant Colonel Neville hurriedly looked forward, but saw that the French steamship was turning quickly in the wind and waves. The boat's movements were so swift and violent, its power didn't seem to be affected too much by wind and waves.

"What do they want?" Colonel Neville was taken aback. Logically, shouldn't the French take the opportunity to run away? What are they turning to?

But Neville quickly figured out the intention of the "orcas".

"The commander of the'Orca' is a very brave and very cunning opponent. He has noticed our current dilemma in the storm, and wants to use this opportunity to defeat us individually."

"The wind and waves made our paddle wheels difficult to use, and our maneuverability was greatly reduced. He must have hoped to take this opportunity to take advantage of the speed to insert behind us, pass in the direction of our stern, and use the side. The side cannons attacked us from our side and the rear part for the arrangement of artillery!"

Thinking of this, Lieutenant Colonel Neville immediately ordered: "All ships, immediately start sailing and prepare for battle."

Now that the paddle wheels are not working well, just unfold the sails and use more reliable sails to control the ships to compete with the French.

All six British steam frigates unfurled their sails and turned into sailboats.

However, these steam frigates have much less sailing equipment than normal frigates because the chimney takes up space. As for the two paddle wheels on both sides of the ship, if they continue to provide power, the power will be on the port side for a while, starboard for a while, and for a while, it will not seriously affect the steering and other actions.

But if the paddle wheel is not turned, this thing is totally increasing resistance. The steam frigate was originally slow and awkward when it only used sails because of its incomplete sails. Adding this resistance makes it even worse.

On the other side, "Equality" began to increase the boiler pressure. In the wind and waves, the speed not only did not drop, but further increased.

The horsepowered "Equality" skimmed from the direction of the British starboard, out of the range of the artillery, and then began to turn, ready to insert in the direction of the British stern. The British fleet began to turn, trying to keep the ship's side aimed at the "Equality", and the two sides circled in the wind and waves.

This kind of maneuver is called "grabbing t" in naval battles. Generally speaking, in warships of this era, naval guns are installed on the sides. Only when the guns are facing the enemy can the largest number of guns fire at the same time. And if the bow or stern of the ship is facing each other, there are very few cannons that can fire.

Therefore, in a naval battle, once one party obtains a position to fire at the side or stern of the enemy ship, the firepower advantage is almost overwhelming. Therefore, warships at war will always try to fight for such a superior position by maneuvering. Even until many years later, fighting for superiority was one of the important principles of naval artillery warfare.

For example, in another time and space later, the joint fleet led by Togo Heihachiro took the risk of taking a "turning back in front of the enemy" maneuver in the Battle of Tsushima in order to seize such a positional advantage; and in the last battleship gun battle-Surigao Naval Battle , The U.S. Navy, which occupied the first advantage, also easily defeated the Japanese fleet at a negligible price.

The steering and navigation of the sailboat are greatly affected by the wind ~lightnovelpub.net~ but the "Equality" is not affected by these. Faster speed and more flexible steering made the "Equality" easily gain the upper hand in the battle with these clumsy steam frigates of the British army.

"Equality" first approached from the rear of "Shen" where the British army had fallen at the rear, then quickly turned, passing in the direction of the stern of "Shen", and at the same time shot Equality with eight starboard cannons. A volley.

In this round of salvo, the "Equality" used all chain bullets in order to destroy the sails of the "Composure" and further reduce its sailing ability.

Because the relative speed is relatively fast, and the sea sways more severely, and Major Marten is playing this trick for the first time, so he is conservative in his actions. When his ship’s gunwale is aimed at the stern of the enemy ship, the distance is also a little bit. A little further away, the accuracy of this round of shelling was completely messed up-none of the eight shells hit.

But Marten was not discouraged. He now has the initiative, and the enemy ship has no effective means to counterattack. It can't hit one round, the big deal, just another round. As long as the wind and waves keep going, he will have the confidence to slowly send these British ships to the seabed one by one. Now, those British ships have become prey, and he is the real hunter.