China Economy Forum

[rcrmj]

I think in terms of heavy industry, China has reached the top 5 spots. The others would be Germany, France, Japan and the US in that league. The question is how is the quality of Chinese heavy industry compared to the other top players?

Any Chinese forumer could enlighten me on that?

i have no idea about this, and capital and heavy industry is not as easy as consumer goods. I think the end user have the say of which countries' heavy industry is at the top league.

as far as my own field of expertise (garment industry), most factories using Chinese machinery, but the best ones are either Italian or German, Japanese and U.S come as second. and I dont think there is any sooner that China can cach-up with them, as matter of fact that 80% of chinese garment industry is made up of small and median size private firms, they are seriously lack of government political and technological support to invest heavily in R&D, and their primary goal is to maximize profit in short terms not long terms..this makes them very vulnerable in difficulty times, during 2009 - 2010 there were roughly 6000 SM businesses closed down in my province alone, and now only the stronger ones that have survived.

and I believe this situation can only apply to my own garment machinery industry but not others like those end users from electronics, utilities or others as we know the government has been investing loads money in those areas. maybe they share better prospect than us?

 

[sweetgrape]

I think in terms of heavy industry, China has reached the top 5 spots. The others would be Germany, France, Japan and the US in that league. The question is how is the quality of Chinese heavy industry compared to the other top players?

Any Chinese forumer could enlighten me on that?

I don't have the info about our equipment industry analyse report, But I think I can show my opinion.
Compare with developed country, The quality of china heavy industry is behind of you as a whole, But some equipment I think we are at par with you, we know that our industry is large and comprehensive, But we know they are weak, Big not mean strong, The important point here I post these info to here is just to show our some progress. AS i said above, When I read these good news, I also will think about whethe we can design and produce the equipment that produce that equipment.
And I think in heavy industry, German is more advanced than JAPAN, even USA, many japan technology and equipment also base on western, And now I still think they didn't surpass you, The advantage of Japan is that they attach importance to quality, Quality is not equial with advanced. Of course, now, Japan heavy industry still is much more advanced than china as a whole. I think our heavy equipment's problem maybe is their reliability and durability, All these need the chang the attitude of design and more test before MP, I think, now many chinese pay insufficient attention on design and test, all these need much money, especially in heavy equipment. But If you can design good and encough test, many problems after MP can be avoid, and in most cases, the cost of solving these problems will much huge than investing in design and test.
I am glad that many chinese pay more attention to good quality. more R&D input, and learn the quality management from JP company and Taiwan company, and I think we need learn the western company experience in design. That's my opinion, Chinese company should learn how to learn, But not only learn how to make, Now many country mock our "copy", It is not groundless rumour, we should accept that, many chinese company still just know "copy" others or part of them. Of course, No everyone can "copy", But after these phase, we should go up, I hope the phase will not been too long. If you want to shut their mouth, Do action to prove yourself!!

 

[Götterdämmerung]

thanks for the info!

I'm an old friend of China and I know the many shortcomings of the Chinese, e.g. they can indeed make top quality, but if you don't pay attention and make it clear that you won't pay a fen if they don't meet your expectation, they would cut corners till the doctor comes. My advantage is, they know I'm German and I tell them that I'm used to BMW and Mercedes quality and cannot tolerate anything less and I know they can do it. That phrase has always worked like a miracle.

Overall, I have seen a vast improvement of quality in all aspects in China.

 

[sweetgrape]

Chinese producer wins Ford's biggest export order
Chinese producer wins Ford's biggest export order - People's Daily Online
JIER Machine Tool Group Company, a leading manufacturer of machine tools in China, has won an order from Detroit-based Ford Motor Company for five large-scale automatic press production lines at two of its factories, the company's president Zhang Zhigang announced on Dec. 29.

It is the first time in nearly 20 years that Ford Motor has bought complete sets of press equipment from a country other than Germany.

JIER will finish the turnkey project, namely delivering the five production lines to Ford Motor in a ready-to-use condition by 2013.

The U.S. automaker's order is the single largest export order that Chinese machine tool producers have ever received.

Among the five press production lines, which will reach top-grade international level, one will be installed at Ford's new factory in central United States, and it will be the factory's only press line.

The other four will be installed at the Ford River Rouge Complex in Detroit, the oldest factory of Ford Motor and a symbol of the U.S. automobile culture, to replace its existing press lines.

 

[SinoChallenger]

Chinese producer wins Ford's biggest export order
Chinese producer wins Ford's biggest export order - People's Daily Online
JIER Machine Tool Group Company, a leading manufacturer of machine tools in China, has won an order from Detroit-based Ford Motor Company for five large-scale automatic press production lines at two of its factories, the company's president Zhang Zhigang announced on Dec. 29.

It is the first time in nearly 20 years that Ford Motor has bought complete sets of press equipment from a country other than Germany.

JIER will finish the turnkey project, namely delivering the five production lines to Ford Motor in a ready-to-use condition by 2013.

The U.S. automaker's order is the single largest export order that Chinese machine tool producers have ever received.

Among the five press production lines, which will reach top-grade international level, one will be installed at Ford's new factory in central United States, and it will be the factory's only press line.

The other four will be installed at the Ford River Rouge Complex in Detroit, the oldest factory of Ford Motor and a symbol of the U.S. automobile culture, to replace its existing press lines.

DAMN!!! Automobile machine tools industry is more high tech than the automobile manufacturing industry. Japanese, Germans and Americans used to dominate this. But now China is a real power to be reckoned with in this market.

 

[Martian2]

Chinese producer JIER wins Ford's biggest export order

JIER had previously exported 10 sets of large-scale automatic press production lines (as shown above) to SAAB in 2007.

Chinese producer wins Ford's biggest export order - People's Daily Online

"Chinese producer wins Ford's biggest export order
By Zhao Yongxin, Liu Chengyou (People's Daily)
15:12, December 31, 2011

JIER Machine Tool Group Company, a leading manufacturer of machine tools in China, has won an order from Detroit-based Ford Motor Company for five large-scale automatic press production lines at two of its factories, the company's president Zhang Zhigang announced on Dec. 29.

It is the first time in nearly 20 years that Ford Motor has bought complete sets of press equipment from a country other than Germany.

JIER will finish the turnkey project, namely delivering the five production lines to Ford Motor in a ready-to-use condition by 2013.

The U.S. automaker's order is the single largest export order that Chinese machine tool producers have ever received.

Among the five press production lines, which will reach top-grade international level, one will be installed at Ford's new factory in central United States, and it will be the factory's only press line.

The other four will be installed at the Ford River Rouge Complex in Detroit, the oldest factory of Ford Motor and a symbol of the U.S. automobile culture, to replace its existing press lines.

（Editor：韩莎莎）"

Reference: JIER Machine Tool Group Co., Ltd.

[Note: Thank you to SweetGrape for the newslink.]

 

[below_freezing]

HOLY ****! this is BIG news.

---------- Post added at 02:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:24 PM ----------

I think in terms of heavy industry, China has reached the top 5 spots. The others would be Germany, France, Japan and the US in that league. The question is how is the quality of Chinese heavy industry compared to the other top players?

Any Chinese forumer could enlighten me on that?

Seems like the old powers Britain and Russia have fallen far.

 

[SinoChallenger]

Look at how young these guys are! They are in their 30's! Our team is both strong and young. So they will get stronger with more experience. Western teams have more experience but they are older. So their performance will plateau.

 

[Götterdämmerung]

Seems like the old powers Britain and Russia have fallen far.

Britain has been de-industrialising since the end of WWII, Russia since the end of the USSR and Russian quality has always been inferior to German quality. One just needs to look at the facilities of a Russian facotry, they look messy and outdated, although Chinese factories are often still not as spotless as German factories, they are still far above Russian or even Indian factories.

 

[no_name]

China has come far since she first modernised. There was an anecdote where when China began to open up one foreign engineer was sent to evaluate the prospect of setting up car manufacturing in China. He was shocked to find a 1890 era Japan made milling machine still working.

Military sector is probably better but still far behind back then.

 

[Martian2]

XAIC delivers 2,000th vertical tail to Boeing Company

Xi'an Aircraft International Corporation (XAIC), a subsidiary of China Aviation Industry Corporation (AVIC), has delivered over 2,000 737NG (Next Generation) vertical tails to the Boeing Company.

XAIC delivers 2,000th vertical tail to Boeing Company

"XAIC delivers 2,000th vertical tail to Boeing Company
English.news.cn 2012-01-13 22:48:07

XI'AN, Jan. 13 (Xinhua) -- A company in northwest China's Shaanxi province has hailed a major milestone in its history of aircraft component production as a sign of its leading status in the market.

Xi'an Aircraft International Corporation (XAIC), a subsidiary of China Aviation Industry Corporation (AVIC), has turned over 2,000 737NG (Next Generation) vertical tails to the Boeing Company as of Friday.

"It means that XAIC has mastered international advanced airplane components manufacture techniques and is becoming a strategic partner of aircraft enterprises known around the world," said Jiang Jianguo, XAIC president.

The 737NG vertical tails are widely used by various kinds of airplanes, such as Boeing 737-700, 737-800 and 737-900.

Currently, about two-thirds of the vertical tails of the operating Boeing 737 aircraft in the world were made by XAIC, said Jiang.

XAIC signed its first production contract, for 1,500 vertical tails, with the Boeing Company in 1996.

XAIC has become the major supplier of some renowned aircraft manufacturers, and has turned over more than 8,000 aircraft components to Airbus, Bombardier and Alenia Aeronautica.

XAIC also turned over the first 747-8 vertical tail to the Boeing Company Friday, marking a great breakthrough in production of tails for large aircraft.

In recent years, the inland province of Shaanxi has beefed up its efforts in developing its aviation industry. Shaanxi is home to one of China's leading aircraft makers, AVIC Xi'an Aircraft Industry (Group) Corp.

Editor: yan"

[Note: Thank you to Polaris for the picture. Polaris' China Economy website has more interesting articles from the last four years and can be found at China Economy.]

 

[Martian2]

China's world-largest 18,500-ton oil-press machine

"China's world-largest 18,500-ton oil-press machine
November 3, 2011

China built the world's-largest oil-press machine that can generate 18,500 tons of force.

On June 28 2010, CITIC Heavy Machinery Company launched a new project for an 18,500-ton oil-press machine. The beam has been successfully put in place and the workers were busy with subsequent installation and debugging. This marks the world’s most-advanced 18,500-ton oil-press machine (via flat-dieforging), which was completely installed by CITIC.

As the biggest and most-advanced oil-press machine, the core components include 5.2m turntable bearings. Each bearing has a 3.4m outer diameter for ball-and-roller combination. The bearings can withstand the largest axial and radial loads. They are manufactured by Luoyang Heavy-Duty Bearing Co., Ltd. The bearings are subject to an all-around multilevel inspection to ensure top quality.

Having a ball-and-column composite structure, this bearing will support not only more axial force, but also radial force.

A 438-ton huge steel ingot was successfully forged by the 18,500-ton free-forging hydraulic oil press.

The new CITIC HIC project, with its 18,500-ton oil hydraulic press centrepiece, was completed on schedule; marking the establishment of an advanced heavy-equipment manufacturing system with a RMB3.9 billion investment from CITIC Heavy Industries.

At 6:36pm on May 22 2008, the advanced open-forging equipment (the 18,500-ton oil hydraulic press machine) was poured successfully. The weight of the upper beam was 520 tons. This heavy casting had a strict requirement on temperature, safety of equipment and team cooperation, and the process was complicated; since the pouring was very difficult. In the history of China's foundry industry, it is a miraculous achievement.

It has been reported that this world-largest oil hydraulic press is the core equipment of “New Heavy Machine Engineering”, which received an investment of 3.9 billion yuans from CITIC HEAVY INDUSTRIES CO., LTD. The equipment has a height of 20m, depth of 7.5m, and the whole machine weighs about 4,000 tons.

A 438-ton huge steel ingot was successfully forged by the 18,500-ton free-forging hydraulic oil press.

The annual production capacity of large forgings at CITIC HEAVY INDUSTRIES CO., LTD could reach 150,000 tons after this “giant” has been put into use.

One of the core components of this “giant” oil hydraulic press is support-bearing E8331-7P which was independently developed, designed and produced by Luoyang Heavy-duty Bearing Co., Ltd. It has also entered the operating phase and passed the quality & performance tests together with the oil hydraulic press. The support bearing has an outer diameter of Φ3400mm and belongs to the rare single-row double-row cylindrical roller design with a single-row ball composite structure. At the same time, the application of LTZC E8331-7P bearing in this world-largest most-advanced “giant” oil hydraulic press fully proved the technical strength and advanced production technology of Luoyang Heavy-duty Bearing Co., Ltd. in China’s bearing technology.

On Oct 10 2011, a 438-ton huge steel ingot was successfully forged by the 18,500-ton free-forging hydraulic oil press, the largest and most advanced forging press in the world. It proves China has reached the international advanced level for large-scale forging and pressing.

The 438-ton steel ingot is the large forging piece provided for the 4,300 rolling mill of Xingcheng Special Steel Plant in Jiangxin, east China’s Jiangsu Province. A double vacuum smelting system has been used in the forging process and the interior quality of the forged piece strictly complies with the criteria from DANIELI assessment.

LTZC, Luoyang Heavy-Duty Bearing Co., Ltd., which was founded in 1992, is one of the largest bearing production bases in China. From industry to the military, Luoyang bearings play a decisive role. LTZC is now a subsidiary under CITIC HEAVY INDUSTRIES CO."

[Note: Thank you to SweetGrape for the newslink. I edited the article for ease of reading.]

 

[Martian2]

Rotor for 1,000MW ultra-supercritical Steam Turbine | China's Great Science and Technology

"Rotor for 1,000MW Ultra-supercritical Steam Turbine
November 9, 2011

China has already manufactured a 12% Chromium high-quality forged rotor for an 1,000MW USC (ultra-supercritical) steam turbine under high pressure.

China’s strategy to meet its greenhouse gas commitment is to continue full steam ahead by converting its coal-fired power plant fleet from a conventional one to an ultra-supercritical one — a move that will decrease its energy intensity from coal-generated power by more than 20 percent.

A coal-fired power plant operates by boiling water to create a high-pressure steam that drives a turbine which produces electricity by moving an electrical wire through a magnetic field.

A conventional (or subcritical) plant typically operates at temperatures up to 1,050 degrees Fahrenheit and has an efficiency of between 33 and 39 percent. Operating a plant at higher temperatures and pressures can increase its efficiency, potentially lowering emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the process.

A so-called supercritical plant operates at sufficiently high pressures and temperatures (between 1,000 and 1,075 degrees Fahrenheit) such that the water and steam become indistinguishable (the critical point of a liquid), allowing efficiency rates to reach 42 percent. An ultra-supercritical plant operates at temperatures of 1,075 degrees Fahrenheit and above and can achieve efficiencies of more than 42 percent.

China has jumped into the ultra-supercritical game with both feet. It is busy building supercritical and ultra-supercritical power plants at an astonishing rate — a whole lot faster, by the way, than we are here in the United States. And China’s ultra-supercritical power plant that went online in Yuhuan in 2006 reportedly holds the record as “the world’s cleanest, most efficient and most advanced ultra-supercritical units” with an efficiency of 46 percent.

Until now, the key high temperature equipment for supercritical and ultra-supercritical power units were mainly imported from foreign countries. China currently requires our national enterprises to domestically manufacture the key high temperature equipment. For making seamless tubes and large pipes, Chinese enterprises will be equipped with more 35MN, 60MN and one 350MN extrusion machines in the near future.

Large-scale castings for 1,000MW USC steam turbine already can be made in China. Large-scale forging have been also trial-produced. High-purity low alloy steel forging for low pressure rotor and 12% Cr high-quality forged rotor for 1,000MW USC steam turbine high pressure rotor are made in China."

 

[Martian2]

Shenguang-2 (Shenguang-II) super laser | China's Great Science and Technology

"Shenguang-2 (Shenguang-II) super laser
October 10, 2011

Shenguang-II super laser

The ultimate objective of inertial confinement fusion (ICF) research is to achieve the realization of controllable nuclear fusion, a kind of subatomic reactions, in which the union of lighter atomic nuclei forms heavier ones in company with the release of an enormous amount of energy; in hope of solving the increasingly urgent issue of energy shortage in human society. Acting as an important experimental platform for the short-term and mid-term ICF studies in China, the Shenguang (Divine Light)-Ⅱ laser facility (SG-&#8545 is the largest facility ever developed in this country and listed among the few high-performance and huge-power solid-state laser drivers in the world today.

In an area as large as a football field, the newly developed “Shenguang (magic rays) II” super laser, which consists of over a hundred optical apparatuses, is able to emit gigantic energy equal to that of a global electricity network in a spark of one billionth of a second; creating a physical phenomenon which is likely to be found only at the centre of a nuclear explosion, the rim of a black hole, or inside a star.

Shenguang-II super laser

Situated at the Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), the super laser, by sending out tremendous energy in a very short time, could create extreme pressure and high temperature to trigger a fusion reaction.

By providing extreme physical conditions, the laser is to be used in scientific experiments and is of great significance to basic research, hi-tech applications, and the development of new technology for national defence.

“Shenguang” has a promising prospect, an expert says, because nuclear fusion holds out the hope of clean energy in future years. By the middle of this century, scientists (as expected) would be able to use laser-produced fusion to turn rich deuterium and tritium in seawater into great and endless energy. Completion of “Shenguang II” marks a step forward made by China towards obtaining energy from seawater.

With the successful development of “Shenguang II”, China has positioned itself in the world forefront for laser studies. For the moment, such huge and precise optical equipment can only be made in a few countries such as the USA and Japan, and the general technological performance of “Shenguang II” has entered the rank of the world Top 5.

In the research, development, test and physical experimental operation of the larger Shenguang-II devices, with the total output capacity of eight-route base-frequency laser (wavelength at 1,053nm) reaching 6kj/100ps. The remarkable progress made in the first laser fusion experiment conducted on Shenguang-II indicates that China has reached a new level in high-power laser physics and technology and in the theoretical research and experimental technology of laser-induced fusion."

----------

The Smithsonian/NASA Astrophysics Data System

"Implosion of Cone-in-shell Target on Shenguang Laser Facilities
Zhou, Weimin; Gu, Yuqiu; Shan, Lianqiang

American Physical Society, 52nd Annual Meeting of the APS Division of Plasma Physics, November 8-12, 2010, abstract #UO5.002

Experiments of indirectly driven implosion of cone-in-shell target for fast ignition have been carried out on Shenguang II and Sheguang III prototype laser facilities. Empty CD shells are imploded using 8 beams on both laser facilities. The neutron yield was measured by the scintillator detectors. 106˜107 neutrons were obtained in the experiments. On Shenguang II, the 9th beam was used to generate a Ti backlighter. The backlit image was measured via a X-ray framing camera with a time-gated resolution of 60 ps. On Shenguang III prototype, only self-emission of X-ray from the imploded shell was measured."

[Note: Detecting the emission of 106 to 107 neutrons is confirmation of fusion.]

 

[oct605032048]

World crude steel output increases by 6.8% in 2011 and China makes the half output.

World Steel Association - World crude steel output increases by 6.8% in 2011