Because the process used by China Tengfei to produce the Chujiao 6max mid-section wing-body fusion body can be summed up in two words: stamping!
Of course, stamping in the field of aviation manufacturing is different from ordinary stamping. No matter the material, process, or difficulty, they are not on the same level.
If nothing else, take the largest closed equipment on the production line as an example. If Balotov guessed correctly, it should be an integrated equipment that combines heat treatment and primary stamping.
Needless to say, stamping, the key is the heat treatment step. What is used is not a simple heat treatment, but a new technology called warm hot forming.
Relevant research has found that at a temperature between room temperature and crystal recrystallization, the ductility and stretchability of metals will increase exponentially, thereby increasing the utilization rate of metal materials, thereby reducing costs and improving efficiency.
For example, for ordinary aluminum alloys, at a temperature of 280 degrees Celsius, the ductility increases from 20% at normal temperature to 80%.
Because of this, warm hot forming technology has become an efficient metal sheet metal parts with high utilization rate since its advent, and is favored by almost all industrial categories such as aerospace, automobile manufacturing, shipbuilding industry, and machinery manufacturing.
Especially in aerospace, the metal materials used are either rich or expensive. If the utilization rate can be increased by 10%, the cost savings will be considerable, let alone an increase of more than 50%.
The question is whether isothermal forming technology is good, and the principle is not difficult, but there is a problem that no one can avoid, that is, what is the optimal extension temperature for processing metal materials? If this value cannot be determined, even with warm forming Not to mention that the equipment cannot produce the most efficient sheet metal extensions, it will be counterproductive and lead to an increase in the scrap rate.
South Korea suffered a loss in this area a few years ago and felt that its level was good enough. Scholars and European and American giants also purchased an aerospace-specific warm forming stamping equipment.
¡°After taking it back and using it, I discovered that the equipment with excellent results when tested by European and American manufacturers was like acclimatized to South Korea and could not produce qualified products at all, so South Korea filed a complaint against the European and American manufacturers.
After European and American manufacturers sent people to take a look around, the answers they gave almost caused South Korea to collapse.
??The money you spend on equipment is only enough to stamp common materials such as low carbon steel. If you want to manufacture aluminum alloy, aluminum-lithium alloy or even titanium alloy stamping parts, I'm sorry, a set of data will cost at least 18 million US dollars.
That¡¯s not all. All data upgrades are handled by European and American manufacturers, and no one from South Korea is allowed to be present. In addition, after the data upgrade is completed, South Korean manufacturers have to pay a maintenance fee of US$5 million every year. If there are further upgrades, they need to be recalculated.
In other words, the equipment belongs to you, South Korea, but the soul belongs to the European and American manufacturers. South Korea is just a tool man at best. It spends money and suffers a lot. In the end, it has to let European and American manufacturers make all kinds of mistakes, and Still changing positions and patterns.
South Koreans are so depressed that they want to vomit blood, but they have no choice but to reinvest huge amounts of money to upgrade equipment data. There is no other way. Who asked European and American aviation companies to include certain warm-formed stamping parts in safety standards? You don¡¯t follow up? Not even qualified to integrate into the human industry chain.
Therefore, even if you are taken for granted and brutally slaughtered, you will accept it.
South Korea seems to be pretty good, but European and American manufacturers can still swing their butcher knives while scratching their heads.
Russia does not have this blessing. Even if its neck is clean and let European and American manufacturers slaughter it, they are too lazy to take the knife.
Yes, even if Russia takes over, European and American manufacturers will not sell similar equipment to Russia, let alone the valuable data behind such equipment.
In fact, the Soviet Union is not weak in the research of sheet metal forming technology and metal materials, otherwise it would not have achieved such brilliant achievements in the aerospace field. However, the disintegration of the Soviet Union suddenly disrupted the original scientific research plan and industrial division of labor, resulting in Russia's This aspect has plummeted.
Warm hot forming is a brand-new topic in the field of sheet metal forming. Although the Soviet Union has dabbled in it, it has not made the progress it deserves. The Soviet Union collapsed. In addition, after the disintegration, Russia made various economic mistakes and directly ruined itself. I was lame from the torment, and when I thought about it, I wanted to pursue it, but I found that Russia was still the same Russia, but the world was no longer that world.
The gap was widened instantly!
????????????????????????????????? And then manufacturers from all over Europe and the United States collectively watched the squirming furry bear awkwardly swinging its body around and begging for licking, and laughed as much as they were watching a comedy show.
The humiliated bear had no choice but to silently return to his tree hole and lick his wounded pride.
However, this is not the key. The most deadly thing is the Soviet era.?The production capacity and troops that we are proud of have become insignificant due to the lack of warm thermoforming technology.
After all, the efficiency of a large number of stamping parts cannot be compensated by the old Soviet-style factory.
And this is just a child among the many high technologies of China's automated sheet metal forming production line. What really turns decay into magic is the equipment that integrates transverse and longitudinal stretching; multi-point precise stretching; and complex curved surface stamping and forming.
It can be said that without this equipment, the wing-body fusion body would not be integrated at all, and China Takeoff would not be able to reduce its own manufacturing costs, and there would be no so-called manufacturing revolution.
Because this equipment uses a moldless molding technology that is more difficult and more automated than warm thermoforming.
The biggest advantage of this technology is that it can stamp and form complex curved surface structures in one step without the need for subsequent processing.
This can be said to be an artifact to reduce costs and improve efficiency for some aviation components that require metal materials and have not too complex structures, but require complex curved surfaces.
The reason why we say this is very simple. The biggest feature of moldless molding is that it does not require a special stamping mold.
You must know that in the field of sheet metal forming, the cost of molds can account for 30% to 50% of the total manufacturing cost; even the cost of some special-shaped molds can reach 70% of the total cost.
However, moldless forming technology directly removes the largest cost source in sheet metal forming. From then on, there is no need for molds, and sheet metal can be stretched and stamped as needed.
This technology is only mastered by the United States and the United Kingdom in the world.
The reason is very simple, because the basis of this technology is the flexible tooling system in the aerospace field. Without the support of this technology, moldless molding is like water without a source and a tree without roots. It will not work at all.
Russia has actually put a lot of effort into moldless molding technology for a long time. However, Russia¡¯s technology in flexible tooling systems is not up to standard, and the moldless molding stamping equipment it makes is naturally full of loopholes.
So that the flatness of the sheet metal parts is particularly poor, and the overall craftsmanship is worrying.
Balotov knew this very well, which is why he was so surprised and speechless when he saw this automated sheet metal forming production line. But once he came back to his senses, it was like seeing a treasure, and he was so excited. So much so that he didn't even ask for other details and went straight to the topic: "Mr. Zhuang, I wonder how much this sheet metal production line costs?"
"It's not expensive!" Zhuang Jianye replied simply: "It's only US$800 million!"
If you like Soar My Aviation Age, please collect it: Soar My Aviation Age is updated the fastest. (Remember the website address: www.hlnovel.com