Development of productivity started in 1981

Chapter 274 Building a Close Relationship
"Commander, this is incredible. The iron smelting speed here is hundreds of times faster than ours. It would be great if we could introduce this technology."

An expert in the steel industry met with the leader at the residence and said excitedly.

"Hundreds of times, *Boss, you are not fooled, are you? You said the efficiency is several times higher, I believe it, but you said hundreds of times? If that's not fooling, what is it?" The leader of the team said with displeasure when he heard the other party's words.

"It is indeed several hundred times higher, but that is only the iron-making stage. If the total efficiency is calculated based on the entire production process of making carbon steel, then it is probably around 20 times higher," said the expert.

"Iron-making stage? I don't quite understand. I graduated from mechanical engineering and also took elective courses on steel smelting. You increased it by hundreds of times in one go, and then 20 times in another. Come, drink some water first, and then tell me in detail." said the leader.

The expert who came in to report heard what the leader said and realized that he had made a mistake. So he took the opportunity given by the leader to drink a sip of water, calm down, reorganize his words in his mind, and then continue with the report.

"Commander, it is like this. The iron-making process of the Quanjie Array uses a technology called 'flash iron-making' instead of using the traditional blast furnace to smelt pig iron.

The specific iron-making process is to first break the iron ore into extremely fine powder with a diameter of about 80-150 microns to increase the specific surface area.

The iron powder and high-temperature reducing agents such as natural gas, hydrogen and carbon dioxide are then sprayed at high speed through a multi-stage nozzle to form a gas-solid two-phase turbulent flow.

At 1-200°C, iron oxides (FeO/FeO) undergo a reduction reaction with H/CO in just 1-400 seconds.

This process is hundreds of times more efficient than our traditional blast furnace ironmaking.”

"Is that so? I roughly understand then, but you said that the overall steelmaking efficiency is still 20 times higher than ours?"

"Yes, the flash iron reduction furnace they use has a magnetic separation device that can aggregate pure iron particles and export them to the receiving equipment. The iron that comes out is almost 100% pure iron, shining silver and dazzling.

Most of this pure iron will be sent to the refining furnace in a molten state. As long as certain elements are added, certain alloy steels can be quickly produced. A small part will be solidified into pure iron ingots and then transported to other processing plants for processing.

The 20-fold steelmaking efficiency is based on the data of smelting a certain grade of stainless steel, which includes the total working hours from iron ore processing to refining alloy steel. "The expert explained carefully.

"I can understand what you said. Many of the equipment and technologies you mentioned are quite advanced. I wonder if Quanjiezhen is willing to transfer them. After all, these should be their most advanced technologies, right?"

"Commander, I inquired from the side and found that the steel industry department of Quanjiezhen is not particularly secretive about this ironmaking technology. They said they are willing to discuss with us if we want to introduce this technology."

"Oh? Can we talk?" the leader who led the team asked in surprise.

"Yes, Commander. I forgot to mention that this flash iron smelting technology can use iron ore with a relatively low iron content. Most of the iron ore in our country can be used.

The amount of coal used is much lower than that of a traditional blast furnace, and the coking and sintering processes are omitted.”

"Well, make a comparison chart for me later on the advantages and disadvantages of the two ironmaking processes, and also give me the approximate investment costs. It's impossible for a technology to have only advantages and no disadvantages."

"Okay, leader. I'll do it right away."

After the experts left, the leader of the team looked at the notes of the meeting and couldn't help but be a little absent-minded.

Although he thought he would be shocked during this inspection, he did not expect to learn about so many technologies that are ahead of their time in just a few days.

This is similar to the scene when Li Hongzhang visited the United States during the Qing Dynasty.

At that time, the productivity of the Qing Dynasty was still at the agricultural level, with almost no mechanical power. However, the American automobile industry was already very developed, the streets were crowded with cars, and the working class began to drive four-wheeled cars.

These days he did not follow the experts to visit various places, but instead negotiated with several senior executives of the Quanjie Array.

The two sides mainly talked about ideology, international relations, their respective future visions and other macro things.

When several senior leaders of the Quanjie Front talked about the United States and the Soviet Union, they looked at both of them on an equal footing or even condescending basis.

Especially when talking about the Soviet Union, the other side actually asserted that the Soviet Union had lost in the Cold War competition.

Even at this time, the Soviet Union's military strength was comparable to that of the United States, and even surpassed it in some aspects.

But the new Soviet leadership was already digging its own country's grave.

At that time, he did not quite believe it. Although the Soviet Union had done a poor job in improving people's livelihood in the past two years, it had strong heavy industrial capabilities and its fertilizer production was several times that of China. It should not be difficult to improve people's livelihood.

However, the other party listed some practices of the Soviet Union in the past two years, which made him hesitate.

At this time, General Ge, the leader of the Soviet Union, was born in the 30s. He had gone through a difficult adolescence because of General Stalin's "Soviet system" and grew up in an era of faith collapse when General Khrushchev criticized General Stalin.

So he was not wary of the West and carried out a series of political reforms.

Gradually certain basic principles were abandoned.

This includes but is not limited to relaxing restrictions on cultural products and allowing a large number of Hollywood movies, Western newspapers, etc. to flood in.

And most of the villains in those Hollywood blockbusters are SLs.

These cultural contents are constantly destroying the faith of ordinary SL people, especially young people, and have brought them great shock.

The United States and the West have mastered the use of this system.

This is the West's reverse revolution, a "color revolution" against SL.

At this time, most people within SL were still immersed in the "sweetness" given by the United States and the West, and unknowingly, their organizational strength was declining.

Although a small number of people knew about the inside story and launched targeted counterattacks through certain exam magazines and even TV stations.

But the voices they make have already fed up the SL people. Having never tasted "freedom", they have longed for the things depicted in Hollywood blockbusters.

This is one factor.

There are many other factors.

For example, oil prices remain below the country's extraction cost line, resulting in their economy continuing to lack the blood transfusion of oil exports.

The quagmire of the Afghan War consumed a large amount of SL's manpower and material resources. As of 1986, SL's annual expenditure in the Afghan War exceeded US$50 billion, and the number of casualties exceeded 1.5.

The Chernobyl nuclear accident almost tore off SL's last fig leaf.

The disaster exposed Soviet technological and management flaws, prompting Gorbachev to adopt transparency measures (Glasnost), accept international aid, and improve relations with the West.

The Soviet Union's foreign debt was high. In 1986, it reached 350 billion US dollars, and it was necessary to obtain the relaxation of loan conditions from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank through diplomatic détente.

All these factors indicate that the Soviet Union is no longer viable.

When the leader who led the team met with the top leaders of the Quanjie Formation, he fell into deep thought after listening to their analysis.

From this to that, at this time, the University of Tokyo was also in a period of close relations with the United States and the West.

In order to improve its industrial production capacity, Todai had previously introduced a large amount of technology from the United States and the West.

For example, a large number of petrochemical industries are used for deep processing of oil and coal, increasing fertilizer production capacity, and improving the grain output of the East China University of Technology.

These introduced projects were successful based on the results envisioned at the time.

The grain output of Dongda University has continued to increase in recent years.

This is not the effect of dividing land among households. After all, the improvement of individual enthusiasm is limited. Even if many people work in the fields every day, it is impossible to produce more food with only a few acres of land under the conditions at the time.

But after applying fertilizers, the yield can be maintained at a high level. This is a good thing.

On the negative side, he had not thought about it before, but after listening to the SL problems listed by the top management of the team, he finally realized that the University of Tokyo actually had similar problems.

While introducing these technologies, American and Western audio and video products are also seeking free access.

Therefore, among the audio-visual products of Dongda University, there are more and more pirated, smuggled, and American and Western products that come from certain channels.

This trend seems to be getting worse.

The thought of this made him feel a little anxious.

Although the domestic propaganda and cultural departments did not relax, the artillery shells from the United States and the West still came in.

And it is difficult for them to deal with it.

If certain management regulations are seriously introduced, such as banning the viewing of American and Western films and newspapers and magazines, it will inevitably affect the relationship with the other party at this time.

After all, relying on the markets and technologies of the United States and its allies, the country's economic development is on the fast track.

Once the emergency brake is applied, many domestic projects that are halfway through development will definitely be affected, and the losses incurred will be immeasurable.

The thought of this gave him a headache, but now that he had been reminded, there must be a solution.

The negotiations over the past few days have been generally very harmonious.

The Quanjiezhen is very interested in the comprehensive strategic partnership they proposed, and several senior executives have already preliminarily agreed. The next step is for the two sides to organize talks under the leadership of the ** department, draft specific terms one by one and give them to both sides for review.

Now, after listening to the reports from two professional expert groups, he felt that he seemed to have found some ways to restrain the United States and the West.

For example, some of the technologies of the Quanjie Array are much more advanced than those of the United States and the West.

Although there are still doubts about its technical source.

But it does not affect their introduction into the country.

After all, you can enjoy the tangible benefits first, and as for the deeper details, you can slowly discover them later.

After making up his mind, he felt that it was necessary for him to go on an on-site investigation.

So the following week.

The leader who came with the team inspected the projects to be introduced one by one.

In GY Steel City, he saw what the experts called the "flash iron smelting" furnace.

This furnace is indeed very different from the traditional blast furnace. He looked at it carefully for half a day and roughly estimated the iron-making speed of a single blast furnace. It was indeed as the experts said, very fast.

He personally used tools to take out some of the pure iron, and then cast it into a commemorative iron plaque.

With a little polishing, these pure iron plates will shine like silver.

As a kind of testimony, he had these iron plates sealed and prepared to bring them back to the country to show them to certain leaders.

In the steelmaking continuous casting workshop, the 3-kilometer-long production line rumbles.

Pure iron flows out of the "flash iron" furnace continuously and then enters the refining furnace.

The alloy steel after refining and adjustment is poured out from the refining furnace.

Enter different production lines to produce different materials.

There are seamless steel pipes with a diameter of half a meter or even thicker, single rails as long as 150 meters, and plates of various thicknesses and widths.

The automation levels of these production lines are quite high, and the number of people on the production lines is pitifully low compared to that in China.

But looking at the various steel products moving quickly along the production line, you can tell that the production efficiency is several levels higher than in the country.

He even went to the other party's iron ore producing area to take a look.

The passing staff specially took some iron ore samples to check the iron content.

It is indeed relatively low, at around 35%.

There are many such iron ores in the country, and the mining cost is relatively low.

Compared with Quanjiezhen's iron-making process, Baosteel, which had previously introduced Japanese steel technology and completed the first phase of construction, appears to be relatively inferior.

In order to supply Baosteel iron ore, China must also purchase refined iron ore with an iron content of more than 60% from Australia.

The cost of these refined iron ore is not low. Although the technology of Baosteel's entire production line is advanced and its efficiency is much higher than those of old domestic steel mills, when other costs are added, it is actually not much lower.

That is to say, it has a good geographical location. It is the place where rivers and seas converge, and it will be the place where steel consumption will rank among the top in the country in the future. Therefore, there must be such a large steel plant that prioritizes environmental protection and efficiency.

After completing the inspection, he and all the members returned to the country safely.

The first thing is that each visiting person reports to their respective departments and presents certain draft documents that have been negotiated to the leaders for review.

Then experts will be organized to conduct a comprehensive review.

In terms of technology introduction, the country plans to introduce complete sets of flash iron smelting equipment and technologies, certain types of refining furnaces and continuous rolling and casting equipment, as well as complete sets of flash copper smelting equipment and technologies.

As for high-speed railways, the country plans to refer to the practices of the Quanjiezhen and first build an experimental railway of about 120 kilometers.

After several rounds of meetings, it was finally decided that the experimental railway would be built between BJ and Tianjin.

The designed maximum speed reaches 400 kilometers per hour.

Quanjiezhen has sent a team of engineers to the country to conduct a line site selection survey, which is expected to be completed in 2 months.

During this period, the railway construction team selected by China will receive various trainings in all aspects, such as the use of dynamic rammers, large cranes, shield machines, bridge-building machines and other engineering equipment.

The total construction period is set at three years, mainly because the early civil engineering work is time-consuming and there are too few domestic engineering vehicles, especially excavators, bulldozers and large trucks.

There are too many construction sites, and not many can be allocated to the Beijing-Tianjin high-speed rail project.

Therefore, the civil engineering work took almost one and a half years.

During the period of completing the civil engineering works, the Chinese side simultaneously carried out the site selection and route determination work for the Beijing-Guangzhou Line, Beijing-Kowloon Line, Beijing-Shenyang Line and Beijing-West Line.

Then, based on the experience and technology gained from the construction of the Beijing-Tianjin line, we will choose the right time to build the four high-speed rail lines.

In addition to railway construction technology, manufacturing technology of various engineering equipment will also be introduced. As for the manufacturing technology of high-speed railway trains, Quanjiezhen also promised to transfer the entire set to the country after completing a certain amount of procurement.

On June 1987, 6, the University of East Asia and the Central Liberation Front reached an agreement to upgrade their relationship to a comprehensive strategic partnership.

(End of this chapter)