Chapter 237 Man can conquer nature
"The first step is to dredge the cofferdam." Qin Tao said, "First block the outside to prevent seawater from pouring in."
Qin Tao began to give clear instructions.
To build a dock, of course, there must be a passage to the outside so that ships can enter and exit at will. Now they have only dug the internal space and have not started on the outside. However, due to the low height outside, there will be some seawater at high tide. Pour it in and increase the difficulty.
The first step is to block the outside.
"Yes, we have thought about it too, but if we want to block it, we have to drive piles outside, and the bottom of the river outside is full of alkali residue." Kong Laoer said.
They have tried various methods, but they just don’t work. The construction is too difficult.
There are many factories in the upper reaches of the river. Over the years, the factories have been continuously discharging various wastes, including a large amount of alkali residue, which flows down the river. They plan to build the shipyard outside, all of which will be filled with this kind of waste. It was like porridge, unable to fix the stakes at all.
“We also tried to find ways to remove these alkali residues, but just after part of them were removed, the river washed away new alkali residues.” Kong Laoer continued.
Qin Tao nodded: "This is a big problem, so we have to break the rules. Since digging can't work, then we will fill it and throw a lot of stones into the water to stabilize it, and then we will drive piles!"
Qin Tao's idea was completely the opposite. This proposal made Kong Laoer's eyes light up: "You are right, let's try it now!"
Kong Laoer did what he said, and immediately mobilized the fleet and started transporting stones. Soon, cartloads of stones were thrown to the bottom of the water. Since the alkali residue could not be removed, the stones were pressed on top!
Boom, boom, boom!
The sound of piling came and went.
New Year's Day has passed and time has entered 1992. Workers are busy working.
One pile after another was driven into the river bottom, and the steel plates were fixed behind the piles to form a curtain. In this way, the outside of the dock was finally blocked.
"Mr. Qin, your project is too huge!" Geological expert Zhang Wenlong was invited. Looking at the steel sheet piles driven in, it was like building the Great Wall. Zhang Wenlong couldn't help but sigh.
Several large water pumps are pumping water out continuously. However, this didn't seem to have any effect, because while they were pumping water, water was coming up from below, and it seemed that the water inside would never be pumped out!
If this continues, it will be an endless cycle!
Zhang Wenlong frowned and said to Qin Tao: "The geology here is too complicated. Under your dock is a special limestone dissolution area, the most typical karst landform. It is intertwined with undulating hills and caves, and there are a large number of them. of fissure water and gravel layers containing confined water.”
As a geological expert, Zhang Wenlong has also visited many shipyard landforms, but none of them are as complex as this one.
Hearing what the geological expert said, Kong Laoer frowned: "Mr. Qin, let's..."
"If our shipyard wants to develop, it must have a large shipyard." Qin Tao said: "The landforms here are like this. If we dig in another place, it will be the same. Unless we move the entire Mingzhou Shipyard Walk."
Move the shipyard? Of course that's not possible. Many people are locals and it's easy to move away. Besides, even if they move away, the huge infrastructure projects here will be in vain, and the losses to the factory will be huge.
Furthermore, moving to a new place will still face a series of problems.
"Mr. Qin, just tell me what to do!" Kong Laoer's eyes showed firmness.
“The next step is to block all the places where water is coming out.” Qin Tao said: “Let’s do it bit by bit. If there is a hole, just block it! We will pump water and construct at the same time! I believe that man can conquer nature!”
Zhang Wenlong shook his head, it’s difficult, it’s too difficult!
However, he soon turned into shock. The workers here are so tenacious and determined. The spirit of the iron man Wang Jinxi flashed in them!
In the gushing water, they put on the water pants used by fishermen and went into the water. They looked for leaks one by one, and then threw in cement mortar. The water pressure washed up the cement mortar. They continued to throw in, and then they poured in cement mortar. In this way, the leakage point was finally plugged by them!
One hole, two holes, three holes…
As more and more holes were blocked, the pumping speed of the water pump finally exceeded the speed of water spraying, and the water on the construction surface began to flow down!
Zhang Wenlong was very emotional, and at the same time he actively participated in it.
“This is a gravel layer and should be solved by uniting the curtain!”
“You should continue digging down here, all the way to the surface of the rock formation!”
Different places have different construction methods. As a geological expert, Zhang Wenlong provided a lot of professional advice. He no longer doubted it. All he had to do was to work with everyone and brainstorm together. He also began to believe it. Man can conquer heaven!
Soft foundation pile grouting, high-pressure fixed spraying, curtain grouting... various methods were proposed by him. These professional geological treatment methods were used here and began to become more comfortable.
The large shipyard has finally been dug out!
Standing outside the shipyard, especially on the tall gantry crane, the scene below is very spectacular. This large shipyard with a length of nearly 400 meters and a width of nearly 100 meters is definitely the number one dock in China! If you plan a basketball court, it can accommodate nearly a hundred basketball courts!
“It’s so big!” Qin Baoshan couldn’t help but sigh as he looked at this extra-large dock.
Although he is the director of the shipyard, Qin Baoshan's presence is already very low. He is still responsible for the construction of the Siamese aircraft carrier, but he still takes time out every day to come here to watch the excitement.
The 400,000-ton shipyard is probably the largest in the country, right? With this shipyard, they can build and repair hundreds of thousands of tons of ships. This shipyard should be the largest in the country.
Qin Baoshan was filled with emotion when he thought about how their shipyard almost closed down before and is now about to develop into a large shipyard.
"Old man, don't worry, this is just the beginning." Qin Tao said.
The dock has just been dug out. Next, a large amount of steel bars must be used to weave the frame, and then the main body must be cast.
“Water is spraying!” At this moment, water suddenly appeared from a location.
Several nearby workers saw it and immediately rushed over. The situation was urgent. The first worker to rush over immediately fell down and blocked the place where the water was spraying with his chest!
Although this is the south, it is still the twelfth lunar month of winter after all, and the sprayed water is extremely cold. Soon the worker's face turned purple.
Other people were also busy, moving nearby valuable equipment. Some people also brought in mortar specially used to plug leaks and started pouring the leaks.
Soon, the leak was blocked.
The first worker to rush forward was soaked and trembling. Someone handed him a bottle of wine.
“Here, let’s take a few sips to warm ourselves up.”
He did not hesitate, picked up the wine bottle, and drank a few gulps. Then, a warm coat was draped on him.
At this time, he felt something was wrong. When he turned around, he saw that it was Mr. Qin!
"Mr. Qin, I can't wear your coat, I'm too dirty." The worker said quickly.
“No, if you don’t keep warm quickly, you’ll get cold. I’ll give you this coat!”
Although Qin Tao did not give him a cash reward on the spot, his coat was worth several hundred yuan. The worker was wearing a warm coat and had tears rolling in his eyes.
This is Mr. Qin! We will never treat workers badly, so everyone is willing to work for Mr. Qin! Even if it means taking risks!
“The Chinese New Year is coming soon.” Qin Tao looked at the busy workers around him and said loudly: “This year, the year-end bonus for all workers in our factory is two thousand yuan!”
“Long live!” In an instant, everyone cheered.
The year-end bonus of two thousand yuan is definitely a lot of wealth. Everyone is very excited. This year-end bonus is equivalent to a year's salary in some poorly run factories. You may not be able to make a living, but working as a worker in Mingzhou Shipbuilding Industry Group, the remuneration is absolutely terrible!
“This year is very special. The construction of our shipyard cannot be stopped, so everyone needs to spend this year on the construction site. However, we will have three days off during the New Year and three times the salary!”
“Long live!” Everyone cheered again.
For them, it’s the same whether it’s Chinese New Year or not. The construction site is so busy and they don’t have time to rest. They originally planned to work overtime. Now, they get three times the salary for overtime work, which is even more exciting.
The news spread quickly, and not long after, other people came running over.
“Mr. Qin, the contract for our second natural gas ship is also very tight. Our workers said that they also hope to work overtime.” Cong Ju has a good relationship with Qin Tao, so she spoke on behalf of the workers first.
"Of course." Qin Tao said, "Let the workers work hard."
"Mr. Qin, our 051C destroyer is under construction..." Zhou Yongfei also followed.
“The construction of warships cannot be delayed.”
“Mr. Qin, the boys in our design office are also very motivated.” Yang Dawei came over.
Qin Tao glanced at Yang Dawei: "Hey, is this triple salary so attractive? Everyone should have the guts to not work overtime and go home to spend the New Year with their relatives!"
“Mr. Qin, everyone is very enthusiastic, and most of the people in our design department come from all over the world. It’s hard to buy tickets to go home during the Chinese New Year.”
In this day and age, it is too difficult to buy a ticket to go back during the Chinese New Year.
Qin Tao nodded.
“So, everyone has worked hard, saved some money, bought a car, and it will be convenient to go home.”
Qin Tao instantly understood that everyone has ideals!
"That's right, I'm just a man who's full but I don't know how hungry he is. Our shipyard is developing very well and everyone's housing problem has been solved. Now it's time to solve the problem of travel." Qin Tao said: "Everyone wants to have Private cars, these are not difficult, I will go to Lao Maozi later and get some cheap cars back!"
Qin Tao is very impressive, holding a mobile phone and driving a Mercedes-Benz G. He is an absolutely successful person. However, he cannot enjoy it alone. Other people in the factory also have this need, especially those who live in other places.
In this day and age, it is very nice to be able to drive a car home!
“It’s good that everyone can work in the factory and consider the factory as their home.” Qin Tao added a few words of praise: “The factory will never treat everyone badly.”
“Taozi, have you forgotten something?” Cong Ju suddenly changed the subject. When reporting on her work, Cong Ju politely called her Mr. Qin, and now she calls her Taozi. It was obviously a private matter.
Qin Tao reacted instantly: "Yes, the New Year is coming soon. I have to bring my wife back for the New Year!"
Although all the workers in the shipyard plan to work here, Qin Tao is not so selfless. He is already married! His wife works in Huating. This is the first Spring Festival after getting married, so of course she has to spend it at home!
When he left Huating, Qin Tao originally planned to stay only for a few days. As a result, he was directing the construction here and constantly thinking of various ways. Before he knew it, it was the end of the year!
Fortunately, the basic problem has been solved now, and only the casting dock is left. Even if water occasionally leaks out from some places, the workers on site can handle it, so he doesn't need to worry.
Take advantage of this opportunity to bring your wife back for the New Year!
After Qin Tao directed the work in the shipyard, he drove his Mercedes-Benz G and drove quickly to Huating.
How long has passed? Is it exactly one month? If so, wouldn’t he become a monk again?
Just after entering the urban area of Huating, Qin Tao's phone rang again.
"Hey, is the CNC machine tool safe? Okay, I'll go there right away!" Qin Tao forgot about picking up his wife and drove to the factory in Huating.
The waterjet propulsion factory has officially changed its name to Mingzhou Shipbuilding Industry Group Propeller Factory. These people are always so uncreative when naming names. I guess they will have to change it in the future! Qin Tao's car drove through the gate and went straight to the workshop where the CNC machine tools were located.
“Mr. Qin, the machine tool has been installed and debugged and can be put into production at any time.” Zhao Changshui said to Qin Tao excitedly: “The data stored in it has been sent to the relevant departments of the Navy for research and is waiting for their decision.”
If they want to produce brand new propellers for the Navy's nuclear submarines, they must have propeller design drawings, and the Navy must compare them to determine which one to choose.
They need to wait for a while before making a decision, but the propeller blank has already been put in place.
In the beginning, ships were all made of wood, and propellers were also made of wood. It was not until 1831 that cast iron was used for the first time in the world to make propellers. Although it was strong, it was easy to rust. Later, cast steel was introduced. The propeller still cannot get rid of rust.
So soon, propellers began to be made of brass. In seawater, copper is more resistant to corrosion than iron and has greater resistance to erosion, so it once became the mainstream.
But as ships got bigger and bigger, this simple brass propeller began to show its disadvantages.
As propellers become larger and larger, brass materials have exposed weaknesses in terms of tensile strength and corrosion fatigue resistance. In order to increase the resistance to seawater corrosion, the brass propellers had to be made thicker and thicker, resulting in increasing volume and weight, resulting in increased power loss, dragging down the maneuverability of the warship, exacerbating the wear of the transmission bearings, and further reducing the service life.
At the same time, as the propeller rotates faster and faster, the cavitation effect on the propeller surface also increases sharply. Brass material is weak in dealing with cavitation corrosion and is prone to irreversible dezincification, which reduces the strength of the propeller. It drops extremely quickly, and even cracks and breaks occur on the surface.
Therefore, warship propellers also need to continue to innovate. In 1876, Cigar Basson created a manganese bronze material for propellers. By adding manganese, aluminum, iron, tin and other ingredients to bronze, an alloy is obtained that greatly improves the performance of the propeller.
As a result, other scientists followed suit and looked for different formulas to obtain suitable materials. The final result was nickel-aluminum bronze alloy.
Although this thing is not well known, if compared, the significance of this nickel-aluminum bronze propeller is equivalent to the use of nuclear power on warships.
The unit weight of this alloy is only 90% of brass, but its cavitation corrosion resistance is three times that of brass. The dezincification phenomenon in highly corrosive seawater is less than half that of brass. The fatigue strength is twice that of brass, which means the service life is greatly increased.
Specifically, propellers made of nickel-aluminum bronze have twice the lifespan and propulsion efficiency of brass propellers. The thickness is reduced by nearly 10%, the weight is reduced by 15%, and the performance is directly doubled. !
Until now, advanced propellers still use this material, but the specific material ratio and process have been continuously improved. Of course, all countries keep their materials confidential.
Now, the blank in front of me is made of domestic material. When casting the blank, it is directly cast into the rough shape of a seven-blade propeller, thus eliminating the need for basic cutting processing.
If it is a whole piece of billet, the CNC machine tool must first cut out a rough shape, which will waste a lot of time and cause unnecessary loss. After all, the advantage of CNC machine tools is finishing.
The alloy material is yellow, but also glows with some white light, which looks very dazzling.
Just as Qin Tao was listening to the excited answers from the people around him, a burst of hurried footsteps walked in.
"Mr. Zhang?" Qin Tao was very surprised. Why did the chief designer of the nuclear submarine come here?
“We have completed the comparison and decided to use the propeller of the Type 971 submarine for the first try.” Mr. Zhang said: “I happened to be passing by here and brought the news to you, and took a look.”
The Type 971 nuclear submarine is the third-generation nuclear submarine launched by Lao Maozi in the 1980s. During the development, it was decided to use a seven-blade large canted propeller, and the specific results are also very good.
In terms of displacement, the displacement of the Type 971 nuclear submarine is two to three thousand tons larger than that of the domestic 091 nuclear submarine. Therefore, it is not possible to apply it directly. It needs to be scaled down. However, due to the completeness of various data, as long as it is simply This can be achieved by modifying the program.
"Okay, now that it's decided, let's modify the program and then trial-produce it." After Qin Tao finished speaking, he looked at the silent foreign engineer aside: "Polustat, it's up to you!"
Polustat nodded and started typing on the keyboard on the control computer nearby.
“Is it done so quickly?” Everyone was a little curious when they saw that Polustad was done in just a few clicks.
“Yes, if you scale it down, you only need to change a few parameters.”
“Then let’s get started!”
As the order was given, the huge machine started to rotate. The milling head on the robotic arm began to move flexibly under control. The metal wires were cut one by one. Watching the machine tool running, everyone's hearts were filled with excitement. There is a feeling.
A new era has arrived. Domestic propeller production no longer requires manual labor. The addition of this multi-axis CNC milling machine has brought domestic propeller processing to a new level!
"Processing will take at least half a month, Mr. Zhang, you won't keep reading, right?" Qin Tao said to Mr. Zhang.
"Well, no, I just came here to see the excitement." After Mr. Zhang finished speaking, he turned his eyes from the machine and looked at Qin Tao: "Mr. Qin, I have something else to do. Can we talk about it?"
“Of course, let’s go to the office.”
Sure enough, when Mr. Zhang came over, he didn’t just come to see the processing of propellers. He also had more important things to do.
"We have studied the subsystems of the two 705 submarines, and many of them have reference significance. Some things we are imitating, and some things cannot be imitated for the time being." Mr. Zhang said: "For example, Say, we don’t know how to process the cylindrical sonar on the bow of the boat.”
Under water, electromagnetic waves cannot be used, so listening to sounds is the main way.
The country is quite backward in this regard. Take a look at the domestic 033 submarine. There is only a bulge on the upper end of the bow, which is equipped with sonar. It is small in size, has poor performance, and has almost no effect.
In recent years, foreign sonar has also developed rapidly. Mainstream sonar occupies almost half of the space on the bow of a submarine, and some are even larger.
Although Qin Tao has never seen sonar on a nuclear submarine, he doesn't think it will change much.
Now, they have disassembled the Type 705 submarine and seen the advanced technology in sonar. They are very tempted. However, when they imitate it, they encounter a big problem. They have no idea how this thing is made!
Qin Tao nodded: "It seems that we need relevant technical personnel from Lao Maozi. I will find a solution for this! However, the cylindrical sonar on the 705 is also outdated. The advanced sonar is spherical. Maybe we can still Being able to overtake in corners and make a breakthrough.”
(End of this chapter)