The military-industrial scientific research system of the academic master.

"That's right, the Three Gorges."

Jin Gui nodded:

“According to the plan, the current first phase of 14 units will be purchased from Voith and Siemens of Germany, General Electric of the United States, Alstom of France and ABB of Switzerland. We will start to consider the digestion and absorption technology for the second batch. Domesticization.”

“However, the factory still feels that this thing cannot just be waited for and depended on. Back then, the relationship between Big Brother and us was very strong. In the end, it was not the backer but the dependence on everyone, not to mention these foreign companies now.

So we started trying to research some key technologies ourselves a few years ago. At first we just thought about doing pre-research, so that we can have some confidence when we bid for localization later. At least we won’t follow others when they play tricks. A fool doesn't know. "

"But as we continued to do it, we found that except for the bearing part, which had no technical reserves and needed to be imported, we seemed to be able to try to do the rest ourselves. It just so happened that the factory's performance in the past two years was good, so we approved a fund. The project is underway.”

After listening to it, Chang Haonan couldn't help but feel a little admiration:

"So that's it..."

Bearings, especially ball and roller bearings, are indeed a long-standing problem for China. In the previous life, when Northern Heavy Industries built large-size shield machines, the main bearings were also the last to be manufactured by companies including Northern Heavy Industries, the Institute of Metallurgy of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Luoyang Xinqianglian. Several units cooperated to conquer it.

Therefore, it was extremely difficult to make other parts of ultra-high-power hydropower units famous in the 90s.

Jin Gui, who was sitting opposite, continued:

"So far, the overall progress is pretty good, but the two areas just mentioned cannot be solved by a single factory. We need an overall plan from the superior department."

Chang Haonan certainly knows that large forgings and machined parts are difficulties in the equipment manufacturing industry, but he is still prepared to hear more specific opinions from industry insiders.

"Is this difficult?"

He knows how to bring up the following topics, not to mention that the person he is talking to is a person who has a strong desire to speak, so it doesn't take much trouble at all.

But this time, the other party did not give an immediate answer as he had done in the past few hours. Instead, he lowered his head and pondered for a while, so that Chang Haonan thought that this question was more sensitive.

"It's a difficult, or not entirely difficult question."

Jin Gui unscrewed the lid of the thermos cup and took a sip:

"Since you are an airplane manufacturer, you should also understand that it is easiest to manufacture something of medium size. No matter you want to make it very large or very small, the difficulty is very high. For example, the Boeing 747 is definitely much more difficult to manufacture than the Y-5. .”

"The turbine end cover we are going to build, as well as the runner hub, the finished product is nearly a hundred tons in size. Especially the runner, because it has to directly bear the impact of water flow, the requirements for the strength of the hub are very high, and because When working in water, martensitic stainless steel must be used..."

"In short, it cannot be manufactured through repeated processing like a blacksmith forging iron. It must be forged and formed with a large enough equipment in one go. This kind of equipment is very complex and involves many different disciplines and fields. It must be It is only possible to achieve this through the integration of national resources by a department of the Ministry of Machinery Industry.”

Chang Haonan nodded clearly.

In fact, it is just like the Nikolaev Shipyard cannot complete the Varyag aircraft carrier on its own.

Fortunately, China still has objective conditions.

It's just that research funds in various fields are not abundant now. If you want to carry out such a project with high initial investment, you have to come up with some sufficient reasons and go to the higher authorities to get special approval.

"Big enough...how big must it be?"

This problem is not that Chang Haonan is pretending to be stupid, but that he really wants to know more so that he can go to Ding Gaoheng for a project later:

"I see that aircraft manufacturers also use super-large forging equipment to make parts such as landing gears. Isn't that enough?"

Jin Gui shook his head decisively:

"Not enough. You should be talking about the 3-ton die forging press in our country, or another 1.2-ton free forging press. They are both single seedlings."

Although he is the head of the supply and marketing department, Jin Gui talks about these things as if he is familiar with them:

"To put it into perspective, that 3-ton machine is already one of the 15 most powerful die forging presses in the world. Germany and the UK are only at the same level as us, but if you want to build the one we designed Wheel hubs are not enough.”

"3 tons are not enough?"

Before Chang Haonan was born again, he had seen on the news that China had the world's largest 8-ton die forging press, but he did not expect that it could have a 90-ton press in the 3s.

"It's not enough. If you want to create it, you must at least..."

He suddenly paused here and leaned back in his chair to think for a few seconds:

"It needs to be at least 5 tons. If we leave some margin, it would be safer to start with 6 tons."

"6 tons..."

Chang Haonan secretly wrote down this number, and at the same time he felt somewhat unsure.

The later 8-ton die forging press was put into trial production in 2013.

As Jin Gui said just now, large-scale equipment involves too many fields, and the equipment manufacturing industry is a very accumulated industry. It would be difficult to replicate it under the current situation.

"Now we only have 3 tons, so this is a doubling. In the field of our aircraft, if the maximum take-off weight is doubled, the technical difficulty is quite great. The current foundation of our country..."

"This...I can't guarantee it 100%."

Jin Gui gently touched his chin:

"But I know that in the late 80s, Qinghua University designed a 6.5-ton heavy-duty die forging press, and had done a lot of production preparations, but it was stopped midway."

"I'm not sure what the specific situation is, but at least related technologies, such as pressure cylinders, pressure storage cylinders, and drive motors, must have been pre-researched. In short, the technology in this area is definitely not blank, otherwise we would not be able to do it from the beginning. There won’t be any ideas.”

This is definitely a huge surprise for Chang Haonan.

The heavy-duty forging press can perform hot die forging and isothermal superplastic forming of difficult-to-form materials such as aluminum alloys, titanium alloys, high-temperature alloys, and tungsten powder alloys. Therefore, it is widely used and can be used in almost all industrial fields such as nuclear energy, petrochemicals, and shipbuilding. Play a role.

Of course, aerospace is also included.

For example, they are needed in the manufacturing of large aircraft landing gear, airframe load-bearing frames, landing gear, large rocket forging rings, etc.

Once it is made, it can be used for tens or even hundreds of years. It will definitely benefit the present generation and benefit the future.

After getting the information he wanted, Chang Haonan calmly chatted with Jin Gui about other more relaxed topics, but his mind was already thinking about how to implement this big project.

Although he has made considerable contributions in the past six months or so and has been registered as the director of the Committee of Science and Industry, such a big job that can be said to involve the entire manufacturing field, let alone It was him, not even Du Yishan, or even Ding Gaoheng himself, could decide it with just one sentence.

Apart from anything else, feasibility studies and cost recovery cycles are always required.

The only good news is that due to Chang Haonan's personal influence, the current domestic large aircraft project should not die suddenly as McDonnell Douglas was acquired in the previous life, and the planned production model is also likely to be upgraded from the 90-ton MD70 to The 214-ton class in Figure 100.

Therefore, after this heavy-duty forging press is built, it can be guaranteed to have continuous use, and it will not be left idle after making a few hydropower unit parts.

But this is not enough.

At least not safe enough.