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Aeronautical Material and Equipment Based on Indigenous Sources

The contract of supplying materials and equipment to China was turned down by the Soviet Union at the beginning of the 1960s. But domestic aero products were continuously delivered, just because the guideline had been set up earlier that most of the aeronautical materials and equipment should gradually be supplied by indigenous sources. So that the Chinese aviation industry could cope with the situation caused by the sudden change of the Soviet attitude.

Aeronautical materials and equipment, in aviation industry, generally refer to the materials, elements and parts and finished parts used for the manufacture of aircraft ( including flying vehicle), aero engine and airborne equipment. Modern aircraft is a kind of product with intensive technology and complicated structure, which needs a variety of materials and equipment. J-5 aircraft, for instance, needed 7,652 items of different types of materials and equipment and 12,319 items for J-6 aircraft. These aeronautical materials and equipment, different from ordinary industrial materials and equipment, are required to work repeatly for many times under conditions of high temperature, low temperature, high stress, heavy corrosion with minimum size and weight. Because aircraft can not be stopped for repair and replacement during flight, requirements regarding strength, stiffness, high and low temperature performance, anti-corrosion and fracture toughness of aeronautical materials and equipment are very harsh. The supply of indigenous aeronautical materials and equipment reflects the level of science and technology of a nation, and the development status of its base industries, and its economic strength.

In the initial stage, new China's aviation industry was based on the very weak foundation of industries, which could manufacture and supply only ordinary steel, brass and red copper and, there was almost a blank of special aeronautical materials; it was completely out of question to supply precision bearing, rubber products, acrylic plastic sheet, large castings and forgings and aluminium materials for aviation use. Although those materials and equipment could be imported from the Soviet Union, but that could not last forever. Chen Yun once pointed out in 1952 that one of the most difficult problems to be solved for the aircraft industry from repair to manufacture was the indigenous material supply. Li Fuchun also pointed out that the supply of raw materials and coordination with other industries were important factors to decide the development speed of the aviation industry. The government, under their leadership, had arranged production bases of the manufacture of indigenous aviation materials and equipment while the plan of basic industries construction was formulated.

Under the unified government planning and directly organized by industries of metallurgy, chemical, machine building and textile, a number of enterprises with fairly good equipment and strong technical force through out China were picked up to undertake trial production of aeronautical materials and equipment and, were guaranteed as key projects by the government for replenishment and expansion. Chen Yun personally led Wang Heshou, Minister of the Ministry of Metallurgical Industry, to Fushun and Shenyang to solve problems of superalloy trial production for use in aero engine. Up to 1955, Fushun Steel works was replenished as the first production base of aero superalloy in China; Shenyang Fourth and Fifth Rubber Factories were emerged as aeronautical rubber products production base; Shenyang No.3 Rubber Factory and Tianjin Paint Factory were reconditioned as production bases of aircraft tyre and aeronautical paint respectively; in Jinxi Chemical Factory a workshop of aeronautical acrylic plastic sheet was constructed; Shanghai Textile Industry Bureau organized relevent factories, and on the basis of the Shanghai Chemical Fibre Factory, to form a complete production line as a production base of special textile materials for making China's high speed parachutes.

At the same time of reconditioning and expanding old factories, the government also focused on the construction of a number of large enterprises to undertake aeronautical materials and equipment production as their main task, such as the Harbin Aluminium Machining Factory, Harbin Bearing Factory and Angang No.2 Cold Drawing Seamless Steel Tube Factory. At the end of the First Five-year Plan and with the completion of these factories, supplying status of aeronautical material and equipment changed rapidly. For instance, after the Harbin Aluminium Machining Factory started its production, proportion of China's own aluminium alloys needed by aviation industry jumped from 2.1% in 1955 to more than 90%; 93% of tubes needed by aviation industry was supplied when production in the Angang No.2 Cold Drawing Steel Tube Factory started. The indigenous raw materials for batch produced primary trainer CJ-5 and its piston engine and J-5 aircraft and its WP5 engine were up to 98%, 96%, 81% and 78% respectively.

The smooth start of supplying aeronautical materials and equipment from indigenous sources was first of all due to the hard work of material and equipment production organizations. People of those organizations thought it was their responsibility to develop and supply indigenous aeronautical materials and equipment and to early terminate the reliance on import. They worked by every possible means to fulfil the task and simultaneously were supported by cooperation of production and application departments. A special organization in charge of development of materials and equipment was set up by the Bureau of Aviation Industry, and a number of university graduates and interpreters, and quite a number of senior engineers, were assembled to translate the standards of the Soviet aeronautical materials and equipment and technical documentation or to provide technical data by analysing finished parts stripped from aircraft. When the first type of superalloy was trial produced, the Ministry of Metallurgy together with the Bureau of Aviation Industry organized Fushun Steel Works, the Aeronautical Materials Research Institute, the Steel and Iron Research Institute and Shenyang Aero Engine Factory to work cooperatively like in a relay race, which greatly accelerated the progress of trial production.

With the performance improvement of newly developed aircraft around 1960, high requirement was put forward on materials. Compared with J-5 aircraft, working temperature of turbine blade of engines for J-6 and J-7 aircraft increased from 750 °C to 800 °C and 900 °C respectively; working temperature of the burner liner and the turbine disc also greatly increased. A superalloy with better composition had to be developed because the original superalloy was no longer suitable. Other materials and equipment had similar problems. It was just at that time that the Soviet Union broke off the supply contract. Hence, the task of paramount importance at that time was to ensure the supply of aeronautical materials and equipment.

In 1960, the Secretariat of the CCCPC and the Military Commission of CCCPC held meetings separately and it was decided to organize forces all over the country to solve the problem of indigenous aeronautical materials and equipment. A series of urgent measures were taken and attention was paid by Li Fuchun, He Long, Bo Yibo, Nie Rongzhen and Luo Rui qing. Vice Premier Bo Yibo went to the Fushun Steel Works personally to discuss and arrange production of aeronautical superalloy. He also instructed the Ministry of Metallurgy to urgently issue a special task order with 104 as its code name on December 29, 1960 to 10 large steel works such as the Anshan Steel Works and the Fushun Steel Works etc. In 1961, in order to solve 'critical materials needed for the production of J-6 aircraft, another special task order with the code name of 105 was again issued by the Ministry of Metallurgy after approval by the State Council. A nation wide special profession group of aeronautical materials was set up in 1963. Assembled more than 20 noted experts including Li Xun, director of the Metal Research -Institute of Academy of Sciences. They worked together formulating plans for indigenous aeronautical materials supply.

In order to break through critical points of superalloy material, the Ministry of Metallurgy had set up vacuum furnaces and electroslag furnaces in the Fushun Steel Works, Qiqihare Steel Works, Dayie Steel Works, Shanghai No.5 Steel Works and Chongqing 102 factory; construction of Gansu nickel mines was speeded up and Shanghai refinery factory where metal nickel purifying was done was replenished. Shen Hong, Vice Minister of The First Ministry of Machine Building and a noted mechanical engineering expert, was appointed to be specially in charge of the manufacture of the cold rolling machine for superalloys. Xie Beiyi, member of the National Economic Commission called a series of meetings to see the progress and solve existing problems. To coordinate the work of the Steel and Iron Research Institute, Aeronautic Material Research Institute, Metal Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fushun Steel Works and Shenyang Aero Engine Factory in tackling difficulties, a coordination group was set up consisting of Liu Bole, Director of Steel Bureau of the Metallurgy Ministry, Fang Zhiyuan, deputy Director of the Bureau of Aviation Industry, Wu Fengqiao, director of Steel Institute and Wei Zhuye, director of Aeronautical Material Research Institute. Through more than four years efforts, chemical compositions of superalloy newly developed and methods of smelting, rolling and die forging were at last grasped. And the material performance was better than that of the imported material.

Up to 1965, not only the 104 special task was accomplished well on time, but also the good foundation of trial production of superalloy needed by aviation industry was laid. In order to tackle the " hard bone" of aviation special bearings of about one thousand types, discussions were held among the Defense Industry Office of the State Council.The First Ministry of Machine Building and the Ministry of Metallurgy and a decision was made to list the two military bearing workshops in Harbin and Luoyang as key projects which were constructed ahead of schedule; technical forces were organized all over the country to tackle key technical problems. After ten years of hard work aviation bearings at last came to the stage of being supplied completely in China. At the same time, metallurgical and mechanical organizations constructed bases in Maanshan in Anhui Province, Deyang and Chongqing in Sichuan Province, solved manufacturing problems of large steel forging and rolling. The Great Wall Steel Works was built later in South-west China as one of the special steel supplying bases. In the 1960s, cooperated with the Air Force and the Ministry of Aviation Industry, Yumen and Daqing oil fields of the Ministry of Oil Industry successfully trial produced various kinds of aviation fuel and oil with Chinese crude oil, hence, the days of aviation industry relying on "imported fuel and oil" were gone forever.

Another important factor of the indigenous supply of aeronautical materials and equipment was to carry out scientific research on the basis of domestic resources to form a series of aeronautical materials with Chinese characteristics. Since the mid-1950s, Aeronautical Material Research Institute worked coordinately with departments of metallurgy, chemical, machinery, petroleum and light industries as well as Chinese Academy of Sciences and universities concerned to undertake trial production while doing test and research, and successfully trial produced and manufactured in succession series of sealing materials, gold based alloys, superalloys, high strength aluminium alloys, synthetic rubber and orientated acrylic plastic sheet for aircraft canopy, etc. Compared with the similar alloy of the Soviet Union and the United States, the high strength aluminium alloy developed jointly by scientific research department of Metallurgical Ministry and Aeronautical Material Research Institute had unique advantages in improving its characteristics of anti stress corrosion and anti crack elongation. The iron-and-nickel base superalloy, non-nickel structural steel and cast titanium alloys etc. developed during that period of time all were original achievements. The achievements in the iron-and nickel-base material fully utilized rich Chinese resources and reduced importation of expensive nickel element. The utilization of non-nickel structural steel and titanium alloy saved the weight of aircraft 'and engine and improved the process performance.

The great effect and far-reaching significance of the government's decision on having aeronautical materials and equipment supplied by indigenous sources became clearer and clearer in production practice. The batch produced J-6 aircraft and Z-5 helicopter needed 12,319 items and 9,019 items of materials respectively, of which 20% could not be supplied domestically in 1960, but could be fully supplied in China by 1965. The more important thing was that starting from the mid-1960s China had already established development and production bases of aeronautical materials with fairly complete professions and types. These bases consisted jointly of departments of aviation industry and Chinese Academy of Sciences and universities, basically possessed the capability of supplying aeronautical material and equipment needed for research and development of new aircraft independently. For example, 4,461 items of materials needed for H-6 aircraft were all supplied in China by 756 factories and institutes; integral panels, high temperature glass, fluorine plastic high pressure hose and metal hose, were better than all that were used by previous aircraft. Materials and equipment needed for Spey engine introduced from England and Z-8 helicopter later in the latter half of the 1970s were better than those previously used. Their technical standard was higher, they were basically supplied and developed in China except only a few. Aeronautical materials and equipment supplied by indigenous sources was really a great achievement of new China.