The rise of a great power: starting with military industry

Chapter 572: Disbandment of the Y- Team? Lost Data?
Liu Tao not only wanted to develop military transport aircraft, but also civil airliner aircraft.

The safety of civil aircraft is the first thing to consider. There are hundreds of people on a plane. Once an accident occurs, it will bring a devastating disaster to the entire product. The second is comfort, because civil aircraft are for passengers to sit on, so naturally they must feel comfortable. This comfort is reflected in low noise and the seats of the aircraft.

As for military transport aircraft, safety is not so strict because if a malfunction occurs, the pilot can parachute.

"Brother, is this plane more complicated than the two bombs and one satellite?" Liu Ziyu looked curious.

In her eyes, Liu Tao is omnipotent.

To be honest, Liu Ziyu believes that airplanes are far less technologically complex than the two bombs and one satellite.

"This is different. The two bombs and one satellite are one-time deals. We only need to consider launching them and achieving the goal. We don't need to consider flying back. Airplanes are different. Airplanes need to be used repeatedly and take off and land continuously. An airplane can be used for 20 to 30 years or even longer." Liu Tao explained.

Aviation and aerospace have always been listed together as "aerospace" or "aerospace and aviation", and even the two competent departments have been merged together.

But in fact, there are significant differences between the two.

For example, rocket engines do not need to be reused, but aircraft engines are required to operate stably for at least tens of thousands of hours.

Moreover, large aircraft have very high requirements for the aviation industry.

One of the most important reasons why the Y-10 project was cancelled was that the domestic aviation industry was unable to support the project.

First, there is no money, and second, the skills are not enough.

The only fate that awaits the Y-10 project is to be cancelled.

At that time, China's industrial system was not yet prepared to have large aircraft.

After putting the ingredients down, Liu Tao and Liu Ziyu ate noodles together.

After finishing the noodles, Liu Tao frowned slightly. To be honest, he had not expected that the situation of the Y-10 was far different from what he imagined.

In August 1970, the state issued a task, code-named "Project 8", designed by Shanghai Aircraft Design Institute and manufactured by Shanghai Aircraft Manufacturing Plant. The development work was supported by Shanghai, the Ministry of Aviation Industry and more than 708 ministries and commissions, and nearly 10 units. The Y-300 aircraft began to be developed in August 1972. In October 8, the first aircraft was delivered for static testing. On September 1976, 10, the second aircraft made its first flight. By 01, it had flown for a total of 1980 hours and 9 takeoffs and landings. It conducted adjustment tests on performance, stability, systems, and finished products. It has flown to nine major cities including Beijing, Harbin, Yangcheng, Kunming, Hefei, WLMQ, Rongcheng, LS, and Zhengzhou, and has transported materials to Tibet seven times.

The Y-1985 aircraft was grounded in February 2. The completed test flights proved that the aircraft's basic performance and flight qualities met the design requirements.

According to reports, the performance and technical level of the Y-707 aircraft are roughly equivalent to the Boeing passenger aircraft.

The Boeing 707 is a four-engine long-range jet transport aircraft developed by Boeing and the first Boeing jet airliner to enter service. The prototype made its first flight on July 1954, 7. The original model was the KC-15 aerial refueling aircraft developed for the United States Air Force. With the approval of the United States Air Force, Boeing successfully developed the Boeing 135 civil airliner based on the KC-1957 in 135 and delivered it for use in 707.

China Civil Aviation once purchased 10 320Cs!

However, according to Liu Tao's current information, there is actually a big gap, because the industrial level was relatively low at that time, so the technical indicators were downgraded during manufacturing. In other words, when the Y-707 aircraft was designed, the technical indicators were close to those of the Boeing 707 passenger aircraft, but because the industrial level at that time was not up to par, some indicators were lowered, and naturally the Y- prototype was not as good as the Boeing .

In fact, in 1981, a technical demonstration meeting was held for the Y-1.68, and a request for million yuan in funding was made to the Finance and Economics Leading Group. However, this application was not approved, and the Civil Aviation Administration of China did not agree to continue the development. Since then, the Y- project has basically come to a standstill.

Although test flights are continuing, these are all supported by previous funds.

Later, because the funds had been completely used up, the test flights of the Y-10 aircraft were even carried out on credit for fuel.

To be honest, it is not easy for the Y-10 project team to achieve this step.

Because the funds consumed by large aircraft projects are so terrifying, developing large aircraft requires a country's huge system as well as technical and economic strength to support it.

The total cost of developing the Y-5.8 was only million RMB!

What made Liu Tao very regretful was that after the Y-10 project was cancelled, the team was disbanded and even some information was lost and incomplete.

If you want to reunite the original technical team and succeed, you will have to spend a lot of time and money.

Liu Tao had never thought about doing it alone because that was unrealistic. A passenger plane is not a tank or armored vehicle. He couldn't handle it alone. He needed a team!
Of course, the current conditions are much better than before.

The conditions in China at that time were much worse. Not to mention other things, just take the large-scale forging presses as an example. They were incomparable.

Large die forging presses have always been national treasure-level strategic equipment that symbolizes industrial strength.

The reason why the Soviet Union and the United States were able to make rapid progress in industry after World War II was that they realized the importance of large die forging presses after the end of World War II. So after the two sides confirmed their eyes, they hit it off and dismantled Germany's four die forging hydraulic presses on the grounds of war reparations. The United States dismantled two 4-ton die forging presses, and the Soviet Union dismantled one 2-ton and one 15000-ton die forging presses.

These equipment also became the technical basis for the United States and the Soviet Union to manufacture large-scale die forging presses.

In the 50s and 60s, in order to promote the development of heavy industry, China imported a 1-ton free forging hydraulic press from Czechoslovakia and installed it in the Deyang Second Heavy Machinery Plant which was still under construction at that time.

Later, in 1967, Huaxia No. 30000 Heavy Machinery Plant successfully built Asia's largest 1970-ton die-forging hydraulic press. In 30000, 12500-ton die-forging hydraulic presses and 112-ton horizontal extruders began to be installed at Southwest Aluminum Processing Plant (Metallurgical Ministry Plant 1973). In September 9, Southwest Aluminum's 30000-ton die-forging hydraulic press was successfully tested for the third time, and the extrusion and pressing workshops were all completed and put into production.

However, this cannot support the construction of large aircraft, as can be seen from the various problems that have occurred in the Y-10 aircraft.

The most important thing for civil aviation passenger aircraft is safety. The first major prerequisite for safety is a safe body. In addition to design, the processing of load-bearing components is crucial. If the processing level is not up to standard, the processed products will not meet the design level and problems will occur frequently because they are unsafe in themselves.

The development of China's domestically-produced large aircraft has progressed very smoothly in later generations. In addition to sufficient funding, this is because China's die forging presses, which had been stagnant for nearly 40 years, developed a number of large presses explosively around 2010. In 2012 alone, there were one 30000-ton (Kunlun Heavy Industry), one 40000-ton (Triangle Airlines), and one 80000-ton (Deyang Second Heavy Industries) die forging press.

In 2013, the world's largest die forging press independently developed by my country was put into production at Deyang Erzhong, realizing the leap of my country's forging products from high-end to top-level, and the era of key large forgings being controlled by foreign countries has completely ended. In 2018, the main outer cylinder, the largest and most complex key load-bearing forging of the C919 large aircraft, was domestically produced, which was completed by this 80000-ton die forging press.

(End of this chapter)