Chinese Economics Thread
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Martian
Senior Member
China builds dams, electric and transport systems, and satellites for many countries
Of course.
From one of my earlier posts: "DMTG, China's largest producer of machine tools, exports products to more than 100 countries."
China and Taiwan have caught up with U.S. advanced five-axis machine tools
Advanced high-precision five-axis machine tool fabricating an engine block
"Foreign companies in China and Taiwan have caught up with U.S. technical capabilities, rendering stringent U.S. export controls moot." (see first paragraph in news article)
Let's do the math. From the seventh paragraph, 45 foreign companies produce advanced five-axis machine tools in the BRIC+Taiwan countries. "China has 20 indigenous five-axis machine tool companies; Taiwan has 22." 45 - 20 (in China) - 22 (in Taiwan) = 3 left in Brazil, Russia, and India combined.
For comparison, "there are six American companies dedicated to producing five-axis machine tools." (see fourth paragraph in news article)
"U.S. Precision Machine Tool Industry Is No Longer A Global Competitive Force
March 5, 2010 Volume 17, No. 4
By Richard A. McCormack
[email protected]
U.S. producers of some of the most technologically advanced machine tools are in trouble, according to an assessment by the Department of Commerce. Sales of high-precision five-axis machine tools are declining. U.S. share of global exports is in a free fall. Foreign companies in China and Taiwan have caught up with U.S. technical capabilities, rendering stringent U.S. export controls moot. U.S. companies are being purchased by foreign rivals. A lack of training programs has created a shortage of skilled workers able to use the complex machinery. Commercial and U.S. government customers prefer foreign machine tools. Export controls are hampering foreign sales. The entire U.S. machine tool industry spends only $1 million a year on research on five-axis machine tools.
These are some of the findings from a "Critical Technology Assessment" conducted by the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security.
U.S. producers of five-axis machine tools had sales of $253 million in 2008, down 11 percent from 2005 sales of $284 million. That was before the U.S. machine tool industry suffered a meltdown in 2009, when domestic consumption tumbled by 60.4 percent, according to the Association of Manufacturing Technology.
Sales of five-axis machines to domestic customers from U.S. producers declined by 19 percent from 2005 to 2008, from $242 million in 2005 to only $195 million in 2008. There are six American companies dedicated to producing five-axis machine tools, and at least 20 in China. Five-axis tools are used for the production of precision components in the aerospace industry, in making gas and diesel engines, automobile parts, and throughout the medical, textile, oil, glass, heavy industrial equipment and tool industries. "Many other industries are discovering the advantages of these machines," says the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS).
Yet "only a handful of U.S. producers actually manufacture five-axis machine tools in high volume and most generate less than 10 percent of their annual net finished machine tools sales from five-axis machine tool business lines," according to the market and technology research report from BIS.
U.S. producers of five-axis machine tools exported only $58 million worth of equipment in 2008. In a tally of global exports of all machine tools, the United States -- with exports of $740 million -- accounted for only 4.3 percent of global exports in 2007.
...
BIS also assessed foreign producers of five-axis machines. It found that not one of the 45 companies that are indigenous to Brazil, China, India, Russia and Taiwan use U.S. technology, parts, components or materials. China has 20 indigenous five-axis machine tool companies; Taiwan has 22. None of these companies have to deal with the types of export restrictions facing American firms. As a result, these companies are able to produce all the machine tools that are in demand in China and Taiwan, plus they are "able to produce in sufficient quantity to export to other LRCs," says BIS.
One of China's five-axis machine tool makers has 24 distinct models. China now has 28 companies capable of building more than 1,000 CNC machine tools. There are 130 Chinese companies with annual capacity of more than 100 machine tools. The country is now supplying most all of its own demand, with only 10 percent of the market being supplied through imports. "In 2005, approximately 59,600 units of CNC machine tools were produced in China," according to the BIS report. In 2007, the combined amount of CNC metal-cutting and forming tools produced in China was 126,268, more than double the amount produced in 2005. China is now supplying its own demand for five-axis machine tools used throughout its military.
The BIS quotes the Export Compliance Working Group of the American Chamber of Commerce in the People's Republic of China as saying: "Given the existing domestic and joint venture development and the foreign availability of high-level machine tools, U.S. companies could not make a material contribution to China's military development. China's military demands are already satisfied by domestic and foreign supply."
The United States exported 515 five-axis machine tools between 2005-2007, and only 12 of these went to China. DMTG, China's largest producer of machine tools, exports products to more than 100 countries.
...
The report is located at defenseindustrialbaseprograms/osies/defmarket researchrpts/final_machine_ tool_report.pdf."
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Chinese companies are building 19 of the world’s 24 largest hydropower stations
Two Liberian boys holding a picture of Chinese president Hu Jintao (Christopher Herwig)
"China is the country with the highest numbers of dams in the world, and in recent years, Chinese institutions have taken a lead in building dams not just domestically but also abroad. Chinese banks and companies are involved in constructing some 266 dams in 65 different countries, particularly in Africa and Southeast Asia, including Kamchay Dam (Cambodia), Mphanda Nkuwa Dam (Mozambique), Merowe Dam (Sudan), and Tasang Dam (Burma). (For more information on these projects, see our case studies.)"
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (L) shakes hands with Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Hun Sen during a token groundbreaking ceremony of Kamchay hydroelectric dam project in Phnom Penh, capital of Cambodia, on April 8, 2006. [Xinhua Photo]
"China's dam builders clean up overseas
By Peter Bosshard
May 12, 2010
...
Low costs, access to cheap loans and a big portfolio of domestic projects make them attractive partners for clients around the world. We are aware of at least 216 dam projects in 49 countries which have some form of Chinese involvement - and counting. Chinese companies are currently building 19 of the world’s 24 largest hydropower stations. The president of Sinohydro recently estimated that his company controls half of the global hydropower market.
The primary interest of Chinese dam builders in their new "going out" strategy is to win international contracts, which typically have much bigger profit margins than projects in China. Companies such as China Southern Power Grid and Yunnan Joint Power Development Co are also building projects in Myanmar and Laos to supply electricity to the Chinese home market."
Sinohydro builds the Kamchay Dam in Cambodia, 2008 (Marcus Rhinelander)
"China's Leading Hydropower Dam Company
Sinohydro Corporation is China's leading dam builder, having built 70% of China's hydropower capacity. Sinohydro is involved in constructing many...big dams within China, such as China’s Three Gorges Project, Xiluodu and Xiangjiaba on the upper Yangtze River (aka Jinsha River), the Xiaowan dam on the upper Mekong River, the Jinping dam on the Yalong River, and the Laxiwa Dam on the upper Yellow River.
Now, Sinohydro is "going out," building dozens of big dams overseas....Sinohydro's overseas projects include the Merowe Dam in Sudan...and the Bakun Dam.... Sinohydro is also building the Bui Dam in Ghana, and several projects in Laos and Burma, as well as a growing roster of projects in South Asia.
Sinohydro's reach is expanding. The company will likely be a major player in plans to dam the Mekong River in Southeast Asia and the Gibe IV dam on the Omo River in Ethiopia. Sinohydro may seek to build the world's largest hydropower project - the Grand Inga Dam in Congo. In total, Sinohydro is building, plans to build, or has built some 105 dam projects in 47 countries outside of China (as of August 31, 2010; see Sinohydro Projects list)."
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Sudan hails world's longest dam
"Feature: Sudan hails world's longest dam
2009-03-04 08:02:34
by Chen Gongzheng, Shao Jie
"Local people come to attend the celebration as the Merowe Dame began to generate electricity at Merowe, Sudan on Mar. 3, 2009. Merowe Dam, the longest of its kind on the world famous Nile river in Sudan's Northern province, some 450 km north of the capital city Khartoum. With a total span of 9.7 km and a maximum height of 67 meters, the Merowe Dam is a multipurpose project designed for power supply and agricultural irrigation. It has a 1.24-billion-cubic-meter reservoir that could help more than 4 million local residents living along the Nile. The dam was built by a joint venture formed by China Water Resources and Hydropower and China International Water and Electric Corp. (Xinhua/Zhai Xi)"
MEROWE, Sudan, March 3 (Xinhua) -- Squinting amid the dazzling sunshine on the brink of the Sahara Desert, Asem Khalil Idris tried to get a clear view of President Omar al-Bahir, who was addressing a crowd at the inauguration ceremony for Merowe Dam, the country's largest hydropower project.
"The power from the dam will create a lot of work opportunities," Asem, 39, a local resident coming from the Wadi Halfa town, said on Wednesday morning.
"Before today, We had to rely on diesel-fueled generators, which is noisy and very inconvenient," he said, adding that "we will have a more colorful life with less blackouts thanks to the president and the dam's builders, and the fruit trees and vegetable planted in my town will get the badly-needed irrigation."
As Bashir signed a takeover paper at noon, siren resounded over the huge dam and the vast artificial lake that has moistened the local air over the arid desert, marking the official start of power generation of the project.
"Photo taken on Mar. 3, 2009 shows a scene of the Merowe Dam in Merowe, Sudan, Mar. 3, 2009. (Xinhua/Zhai Xi)"
The 9.7-km dam is the longest one in the world with a total capacity of 1.25 million kilowatt, twice as much as Sudan's existing power supply.
Wielding his stick, encircled by entourages, Bashir danced to the rhythm of a 30-minute folk song on a table on a improvised platform. The president's trademark style was applauded by a crowd, who raised a forest of arms and chanted religious slogans.
"It's an important day and we got it finally," said Rashid in the crowd, who clapped his hands jubilantly in the crowd as the voluble president made statements and danced. "But I have not decided where to go after the dam."
Rashid, in his forties, a veteran driver, who has worked for CCMD JV, a Chinese joint venture that built the dam, for some five years.
"I hope it's not my last drive to Merowe," Rashid said with a little blue earlier on our way to the remote dam, some 450-km north of the capital city Khartoum.
The SUV took a U-turn at an intersection, where scores of people were standing on the roadside of a small town with various banners in their hands.
"This town is a local tourist attraction," Rashid said, "they are advertising for their town and the banner reads 'great place, good price' in Arabic."
A man holding a portrait of Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir (R2, front) attends a ceremony at Merowe Dam in Merowe, Sudan, Mar. 3, 2009. (Xinhua/Zhai Xi)
"CCMD (JV) rebuilt the desert road to Merowe for material transportation, and those people want to make more money because it saves a lot of time for the tourists coming from the capital," he said while flooring the accelerator pedal of the vehicle, which rustled through the strong north wind.
"It's a state-of-the-art project," said Wu Xiguo, chief engineer and deputy manager of the dam. "We won the contract at a much [more] reasonable price and finished it on time."
"The biggest challenge is the climate of Merowe," said Wu, who has got a good tan at the dam in the past six years. "The average temperature is about 40 degrees and some of my friends got malaria in the mosquito-ridden area."
"Another problem is the lack of resources," he added, "We came here in July 2003 and found nothing except the river and the infertile Sahara, so we have to import nearly everything, including toothpaste."
He said that the dam's eight 350-ton super cranes, dubbed "Gate Machine" in their jargon, were all shipped from China.
"But it pays, it will stand on the river for at least 100 years and some 4 million Sudanese people, or more than one-tenth of the total population, will benefit from the dam's irrigation system and power supply," he said.
Editor: Xiong Tong"
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From an earlier post: During the past few years, we have seen the pictures of China's proliferating world-class infrastructure. We are now starting to see the beginning of a new era. Other countries have decided that they want to improve their economies with modern infrastructure and they're contracting with China to build their important projects.
"China earns newfound respect with Mashair
By SIRAJ WAHAB | ARAB NEWS
Published: Nov 20, 2010 00:13 Updated: Nov 20, 2010 00:46
"Made in China" is no longer a taboo label, thanks to Mashair railway. (AN photo)
MINA: Perhaps the most notable improvement of Saudi Arabia’s many projects to accommodate Haj pilgrims is the railway that shuttled tens of thousands of people around the holy sites.
As the modern, high-tech trains picked up and dropped off passengers, they created a newfound respect for Chinese-made products and Chinese-engineering prowess. Officials said the multibillion-riyal project that was started last year will about triple its capacity from present levels when completed in 2012. Nonetheless, the rail system has already alleviated vehicular traffic around Mina and made travel for many pilgrims a snap.
The Sino-Saudi relationship has been growing over the last decade as China has sought more fossil fuels to power its economic growth. Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah helped realign the nation’s trade relationships with the implementation of a “Look East” policy, which has fostered imports of heavy machinery and construction equipment as well as consumer goods. China has also raised the quality of its exported goods to fight earlier perceptions that its exports were inferior to products manufactured elsewhere.
“We would go to shopping malls and ask for Made-in-Germany and Made-in-Japan stuff. We would look down upon Made-in-China stuff,” said Suleiman Al-Hatrash, a social-sciences teacher at an Abha college. “We started taking China seriously when we went to the Western countries and saw their shopping malls filled with Made-in-China goods.”
However, the state-of-the-art rail system is changing peoples’ perceptions about China almost as fast as it is whisking passengers around Mina.
“People couldn’t believe their eyes when they saw pilgrims being ferried between the holy sites of Mina, Muzdalifah and Arafat,” said journalist Hadi Fakihi. “Those who rode the train were gushing about its high-tech aspects. China has overnight become a nation to respect and emulate.”
“China has won hearts with this successful project,” said Rashad Husein, vice president of the South Asian Pilgrim Establishment. “It is the first time China has executed such a massive project in the Islamic world. This will not only bring China and the Muslim world closer; this will strengthen the bond between Saudi Arabia and China.”
The technology transfers are not one way. Saudi Aramco, the Kingdom’s national oil company, has lent refining expertise and resources to oil and petrochemical projects in partnership with Chinese companies. Some less tangible things are being exported back to China as well.
Of China’s population of nearly 1.4 billion, about 23 million are Muslims. About 13,000 Chinese Muslims performed Haj this year, which included imams, doctors and government officials. Most of the Chinese railway engineers were not Muslims when they arrived in the Kingdom. A special town was set up for them beyond the jurisdiction of Makkah as the holy city is off-limits to non-Muslims. During the course of the construction of the railway, many of the Chinese engineers embraced Islam.
“That led to even greater love and respect for the Chinese,” said Ali Al-Harithy, a Saudi businessman conducting commerce with China. He said he also was impressed that the new stronger ties with China don’t seem to be disruptive to the Kingdom’s longstanding associations with the United States and Europe.
“It was America that helped the Arab states discover oil, and ever since ties between Saudi Arabia and the United States have been very close,” Al-Harithy said. “For China to create space for itself in this region is phenomenal. This Makkah Metro is world-class, and every single aspect of it was carried out in Chinese factories by Chinese technicians and engineers. It is an engineering marvel. Hats off to the Chinese.”
“‘Made in China’ is no longer a taboo label,” said Sudanese journalist Hassan Ibrahim. 'It has now earned a halo of respectability.'”
Exciting pictures of new China-built Mashair Railway in Saudi Arabia
The 6.5-billion-riyal (1.7 billion dollar), 18-kilometre (11-mile) Al-Mashair rail connects Mecca to Arafat, Muzdalifa and Mina, site of a massive tent city that houses more than one million pilgrims.
Pilgrims on Makkah Metro Mashair!
การทดสอบรถไฟ Mashair Railway ที่ซาอุเตรียมไว้บริการฮุจญาต
Trains will move at speeds between 80 and 120 km/hour.
A man stands watching the newly-opened Holy Sites metro light-rail in the western Saudi city of Mecca on November 2.
The railway will reduce the time it takes for pilgrims to move from Arafat to Muzdalifah to five minutes on the 9th of Dul Hijjah. It will also take pilgrims five minutes to move from Muzdalifah to Mina on the 10th.
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"KiwiRail's locos chug in from China
Sandra Conchie | 22nd November 2010
The first six of Kiwirail's 20 new DL class locomotive engines were unloaded at the Port of Tauranga yesterday, an occasion anxiously anticipated and welcomed by all those involved with the almost $80 million project.
Vessel Beluga Foresight delivered its special cargo from China to the Port of Tauranga on Friday and the double-cab diesel locomotives, each weighing nearly 108 tonnes, were transported to the Norske Skog marshalling yard yesterday and lifted by cranes on to the railway tracks for closer inspection.
The first six of KiwiRail's 20 new DL class locomotives unloaded at the Port of Tauranga. (Photo / Sam Ackland)
Built by China's Dalian Locomotive and Rolling Stock Company to Kiwirail specifications, they are expected to be in service before Christmas.
They will be used on the Auckland-Hamilton-Tauranga "golden triangle" freight route and also on Bay of Plenty forestry routes.
They have a 2,700kw engine, will be hauling 2,000 tonnes of freight and are expected to be 5 to 10 per cent more fuel efficient than the existing 149 fleet of engines.
Where they can replace two existing locomotives, the fuel saving is expected to reach almost 30 per cent.
A beaming KiwiRail project manager Scott Murray said the locomotives would undergo a thorough inspection and testing process in preparation for their commissioning before Christmas, including testing the braking system, stopping performance and the load pulling power.
Mr Murray said the new locomotives were the start of some significant investment by KiwiRail in its rolling stock and would have a huge impact on the turnaround capacity of freight haulage.
He said it was part of the company's strategic plan to grow the business and start to retire some of its old engines.
These are the first locomotives to have arrived in the country in nearly 35 years - the newest diesel locomotives in the current fleet are more than 34 years old and the oldest 45 years.
Chief designer Maoye Cong was on hand to make a closer inspection on Friday, followed by a special blessing by locomotive engineer Ricky Kura who has worked for KiwiRail for 34 years.
Mr Cong, who headed a team of 30 designers and worked closely with KiwiRail representatives on the design specifications, said it had been a challenging project, particularly because of the cultural and language differences but one he was very proud to be involved with.
"It's just like waiting to seeing a baby being born. Now it has arrived, it's very exciting."
Noting the first locomotive engine was number 9008 - the nine in Chinese symbolising longevity and eight meaning prosperity, also raised quite a few smiles among the KiwiRail staff.
Mr Murray said the remaining 14 locomotives in the $80 million purchase were due to arrive early next year and will deployed around the North Island."
Note: Thank you to "Schumacher" for the post.
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From an earlier post, China's commercial jet airplane export industry is "taking off."
ARJ-21 jets to be delivered starting from 2011
China's Advanced Regional Jet for the 21st Century
"ARJ21 jets to be delivered starting from 2011
13:38, July 22, 2010
China's first ARJ21 regional jet is expected to be delivered in 2011, the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC), which develops domestically-made jumbo jets and sells the ARJ21 aircraft, reported during the Farnborough International Air Show on July 21.
ARJ21 is a new type of short-to-medium-range, turbofan-powered regional jet independently developed by China. It has 70 to 100 seats and a maximum range of 2,000 nautical miles. Designed in accordance with international airworthiness standards, the aircraft can meet requirements such as takeoff and landing in plateau or high-temperature airports.
According to COMAC, the ARJ21 regional jet had its first test flight on Nov. 28, 2008 and has entered the airworthiness certification and certificate application stage. Four ARJ21 regional jets have participated in test flights with a cumulative flight time of more than 600 hours. Confirmed overseas and domestic orders and orders of intent have amounted to 240 and the first aircraft is scheduled to be delivered in 2011.
The pre-sale price of the new ARJ21 regional jet is 27 million to 29 million U.S. dollars, giving the ARJ21 regional jet a price advantage over its peers in the international market.
COMAC also noted that China's jumbo jet project will enter the engineering development phase next year. The suppliers for the project have generally been selected after key suppliers of the airframe structure, power units and system devices, materials and standard components were fixed.
Equipment for the C919 jumbo jets will be supplied by 13 international aviation manufacturing enterprises. Meanwhile, over 30 domestic enterprises have passed the preliminary material supply reviews and more than 50 domestic enterprises have been selected as potential standard component suppliers.
COMAC added that the overall technical plan, manufacturing plan and customer service plan for the C919 jumbo jets will be compiled in 2010. The C919 jumbo jets are scheduled to conduct the first test flights in 2014 and be delivered in 2016.
By People's Daily Online"
ARJ-21 cockpit
ARJ-21 pilot controls
ARJ-21 interior cabin space
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From one of my earlier posts: China's SANY has thriving American, European, Indian, and Latin American subsidiaries. SANY is "a global corporation with five industrial parks in China, four R&D and manufacturing bases in America, Germany, India and Brazil, and 24 sales companies around the world. Currently, Sany employs over 53,000 people in more than 120 countries."
SANY launches Asia's largest crawler crane
SANY Heavy Industry 1,180-ton crawler crane SCC11800. "SCC11800 crawler crane has a maximum lifting capacity of 1180 tons; the equivalent of lifting six [fully-loaded] Boeing 747 aircraft" (e.g. 88 tons empty weight per Boeing 747).
November 27, 2009 The special-engineering company in Guangdong, with SANY SCC9000-type 900-ton crawler crane, successfully lifts the dome into place at Ningde Nuclear Power Station 1000MW nuclear power plant No. 1.
"Sany launches Asia's largest crawler crane. (News roundup)
Article from: Cranes Today | March 1, 2008
SHANGHAI SANY SCIENCE & Technology Co, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sany Group, is launching a crawler crane with a maximum lifting capacity of 900t (and a maximum load-moment of 13,500 tm), which it claims is the largest-capacity crawler ever made by an Asian company.
In the past, large crawler cranes have only been available in China as imports, but over the last few years Chinese manufacturers have rolled out larger and larger crawlers. Shanghai Sany said its goal is "to fully replace the import of crawler cranes and enter the international market."
In superlift configuration, the crane can lift 900t at 7m radius (and out to 12m), and 800t to 17m. In this …"
"About SANY America
SANY Group Company Ltd. was established in 1989 in China. SANY is the largest heavy equipment manufacturer in China, and also one of the top 10 heavy equipment manufacturers in the world. SANY employs more than 30,000 employees worldwide.
SANY Heavy Industry, a core entity of SANY Group, is a publicly traded company listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange. SANY Group has had an annual growth rate of 50% for the past 10 years. Despite the impact of global economy recession in 2008 and 2009, SANY Group maintained a 50% annual growth rate and achieved $3 billion in sales revenue.
As one of the overseas subsidiaries of Sany Heavy Industry Company, Sany America Inc. was founded in 2006. This North American headquarters is located in Peachtree City, Georgia.
September 12, 2007 Sany Heavy Industry signed an investment deal with the State of Georgia. According to this agreement, Sany shall invest in 228 acres and over $100 million to create and establish a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility; constructing and engineering Sany products to be competitive both in price and quality for all of North America. We have broken ground on phase one of our facility and estimate completion in the second half of 2011. The first phase on construction will consist of a 360,000 square foot manufacturing facility as well as 3 stories of office area totaling 180,000 square feet. With an expected 300 employees by the third year, SANY America will focus on R&D, assembly, marketing and sales of our Truck Mounted Concrete Pumps, Stackers, Handlers, Motor Graders, Drilling Rigs, Excavators and Hydraulic Crawler Cranes which will begin production soon after the completion of our manufacturing facility.
With pride we integrate global resources to provide our customers with excellent equipment and services with unique advantages in cost, performance and localized manufacture, localized management and localized services. At Sany America, we are committed to the North American Market and bringing our customers a successful and outstanding product."
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Bolivia Agrees To Buy $300 Million Communications Satellite From China
China designed, built, and helped finance a communications satellite for Nigeria. It was launched from Sichuan Province in China on May 14, 2007. (Li Gang/Xinhua, via Associated Press)
The successful launch of Nigcomsat-1, a communications satellite for Nigeria, was celebrated at the launch center in Xichang, China. (Li Gang/Xinhua via Newscom)
DFH-4 satellite bus (or platform) designed and built by CGWIC (i.e. China Great Wall Industrial Corporation)
DFH-4 satellite technical specifications
"Bolivia Agrees To Buy $300 Million Communications Satellite From China
Dec 13, 2010
Dow Jones Newswires
BUENOS AIRES -(Dow Jones)- The Bolivian government has signed a contract with China Great Wall Industries Corporation, or Cgwic, to purchase a $300 million communications satellite, Bolivia's state news agency ABI reported Monday.
The satellite, dubbed the Tupac Katari, after the Aymara Indian rebel leader in the late 1700's, is expected to be operational within the next 36 months. The Bolivian government will pay $45 million for the satellite, with the rest financed by a loan from the China Development Bank, according to ABI.
The satellite will have an useful life of 15 years and will bring communications coverage to all of Bolivia, as well as neighboring countries, ABI said.
Cgwic was established in 1980 and is controlled by the government's China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.
-By Shane Romig, Dow Jones Newswires; 54-11-4103-6738; [email protected]"
Of course.
From one of my earlier posts: "DMTG, China's largest producer of machine tools, exports products to more than 100 countries."
China and Taiwan have caught up with U.S. advanced five-axis machine tools
Advanced high-precision five-axis machine tool fabricating an engine block
"Foreign companies in China and Taiwan have caught up with U.S. technical capabilities, rendering stringent U.S. export controls moot." (see first paragraph in news article)
Let's do the math. From the seventh paragraph, 45 foreign companies produce advanced five-axis machine tools in the BRIC+Taiwan countries. "China has 20 indigenous five-axis machine tool companies; Taiwan has 22." 45 - 20 (in China) - 22 (in Taiwan) = 3 left in Brazil, Russia, and India combined.
For comparison, "there are six American companies dedicated to producing five-axis machine tools." (see fourth paragraph in news article)
"U.S. Precision Machine Tool Industry Is No Longer A Global Competitive Force
March 5, 2010 Volume 17, No. 4
By Richard A. McCormack
[email protected]
U.S. producers of some of the most technologically advanced machine tools are in trouble, according to an assessment by the Department of Commerce. Sales of high-precision five-axis machine tools are declining. U.S. share of global exports is in a free fall. Foreign companies in China and Taiwan have caught up with U.S. technical capabilities, rendering stringent U.S. export controls moot. U.S. companies are being purchased by foreign rivals. A lack of training programs has created a shortage of skilled workers able to use the complex machinery. Commercial and U.S. government customers prefer foreign machine tools. Export controls are hampering foreign sales. The entire U.S. machine tool industry spends only $1 million a year on research on five-axis machine tools.
These are some of the findings from a "Critical Technology Assessment" conducted by the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security.
U.S. producers of five-axis machine tools had sales of $253 million in 2008, down 11 percent from 2005 sales of $284 million. That was before the U.S. machine tool industry suffered a meltdown in 2009, when domestic consumption tumbled by 60.4 percent, according to the Association of Manufacturing Technology.
Sales of five-axis machines to domestic customers from U.S. producers declined by 19 percent from 2005 to 2008, from $242 million in 2005 to only $195 million in 2008. There are six American companies dedicated to producing five-axis machine tools, and at least 20 in China. Five-axis tools are used for the production of precision components in the aerospace industry, in making gas and diesel engines, automobile parts, and throughout the medical, textile, oil, glass, heavy industrial equipment and tool industries. "Many other industries are discovering the advantages of these machines," says the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS).
Yet "only a handful of U.S. producers actually manufacture five-axis machine tools in high volume and most generate less than 10 percent of their annual net finished machine tools sales from five-axis machine tool business lines," according to the market and technology research report from BIS.
U.S. producers of five-axis machine tools exported only $58 million worth of equipment in 2008. In a tally of global exports of all machine tools, the United States -- with exports of $740 million -- accounted for only 4.3 percent of global exports in 2007.
...
BIS also assessed foreign producers of five-axis machines. It found that not one of the 45 companies that are indigenous to Brazil, China, India, Russia and Taiwan use U.S. technology, parts, components or materials. China has 20 indigenous five-axis machine tool companies; Taiwan has 22. None of these companies have to deal with the types of export restrictions facing American firms. As a result, these companies are able to produce all the machine tools that are in demand in China and Taiwan, plus they are "able to produce in sufficient quantity to export to other LRCs," says BIS.
One of China's five-axis machine tool makers has 24 distinct models. China now has 28 companies capable of building more than 1,000 CNC machine tools. There are 130 Chinese companies with annual capacity of more than 100 machine tools. The country is now supplying most all of its own demand, with only 10 percent of the market being supplied through imports. "In 2005, approximately 59,600 units of CNC machine tools were produced in China," according to the BIS report. In 2007, the combined amount of CNC metal-cutting and forming tools produced in China was 126,268, more than double the amount produced in 2005. China is now supplying its own demand for five-axis machine tools used throughout its military.
The BIS quotes the Export Compliance Working Group of the American Chamber of Commerce in the People's Republic of China as saying: "Given the existing domestic and joint venture development and the foreign availability of high-level machine tools, U.S. companies could not make a material contribution to China's military development. China's military demands are already satisfied by domestic and foreign supply."
The United States exported 515 five-axis machine tools between 2005-2007, and only 12 of these went to China. DMTG, China's largest producer of machine tools, exports products to more than 100 countries.
...
The report is located at defenseindustrialbaseprograms/osies/defmarket researchrpts/final_machine_ tool_report.pdf."
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Chinese companies are building 19 of the world’s 24 largest hydropower stations
Two Liberian boys holding a picture of Chinese president Hu Jintao (Christopher Herwig)
"China is the country with the highest numbers of dams in the world, and in recent years, Chinese institutions have taken a lead in building dams not just domestically but also abroad. Chinese banks and companies are involved in constructing some 266 dams in 65 different countries, particularly in Africa and Southeast Asia, including Kamchay Dam (Cambodia), Mphanda Nkuwa Dam (Mozambique), Merowe Dam (Sudan), and Tasang Dam (Burma). (For more information on these projects, see our case studies.)"
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (L) shakes hands with Cambodian Prime Minister Samdech Hun Sen during a token groundbreaking ceremony of Kamchay hydroelectric dam project in Phnom Penh, capital of Cambodia, on April 8, 2006. [Xinhua Photo]
"China's dam builders clean up overseas
By Peter Bosshard
May 12, 2010
...
Low costs, access to cheap loans and a big portfolio of domestic projects make them attractive partners for clients around the world. We are aware of at least 216 dam projects in 49 countries which have some form of Chinese involvement - and counting. Chinese companies are currently building 19 of the world’s 24 largest hydropower stations. The president of Sinohydro recently estimated that his company controls half of the global hydropower market.
The primary interest of Chinese dam builders in their new "going out" strategy is to win international contracts, which typically have much bigger profit margins than projects in China. Companies such as China Southern Power Grid and Yunnan Joint Power Development Co are also building projects in Myanmar and Laos to supply electricity to the Chinese home market."
Sinohydro builds the Kamchay Dam in Cambodia, 2008 (Marcus Rhinelander)
"China's Leading Hydropower Dam Company
Sinohydro Corporation is China's leading dam builder, having built 70% of China's hydropower capacity. Sinohydro is involved in constructing many...big dams within China, such as China’s Three Gorges Project, Xiluodu and Xiangjiaba on the upper Yangtze River (aka Jinsha River), the Xiaowan dam on the upper Mekong River, the Jinping dam on the Yalong River, and the Laxiwa Dam on the upper Yellow River.
Now, Sinohydro is "going out," building dozens of big dams overseas....Sinohydro's overseas projects include the Merowe Dam in Sudan...and the Bakun Dam.... Sinohydro is also building the Bui Dam in Ghana, and several projects in Laos and Burma, as well as a growing roster of projects in South Asia.
Sinohydro's reach is expanding. The company will likely be a major player in plans to dam the Mekong River in Southeast Asia and the Gibe IV dam on the Omo River in Ethiopia. Sinohydro may seek to build the world's largest hydropower project - the Grand Inga Dam in Congo. In total, Sinohydro is building, plans to build, or has built some 105 dam projects in 47 countries outside of China (as of August 31, 2010; see Sinohydro Projects list)."
-----
Sudan hails world's longest dam
"Feature: Sudan hails world's longest dam
2009-03-04 08:02:34
by Chen Gongzheng, Shao Jie
"Local people come to attend the celebration as the Merowe Dame began to generate electricity at Merowe, Sudan on Mar. 3, 2009. Merowe Dam, the longest of its kind on the world famous Nile river in Sudan's Northern province, some 450 km north of the capital city Khartoum. With a total span of 9.7 km and a maximum height of 67 meters, the Merowe Dam is a multipurpose project designed for power supply and agricultural irrigation. It has a 1.24-billion-cubic-meter reservoir that could help more than 4 million local residents living along the Nile. The dam was built by a joint venture formed by China Water Resources and Hydropower and China International Water and Electric Corp. (Xinhua/Zhai Xi)"
MEROWE, Sudan, March 3 (Xinhua) -- Squinting amid the dazzling sunshine on the brink of the Sahara Desert, Asem Khalil Idris tried to get a clear view of President Omar al-Bahir, who was addressing a crowd at the inauguration ceremony for Merowe Dam, the country's largest hydropower project.
"The power from the dam will create a lot of work opportunities," Asem, 39, a local resident coming from the Wadi Halfa town, said on Wednesday morning.
"Before today, We had to rely on diesel-fueled generators, which is noisy and very inconvenient," he said, adding that "we will have a more colorful life with less blackouts thanks to the president and the dam's builders, and the fruit trees and vegetable planted in my town will get the badly-needed irrigation."
As Bashir signed a takeover paper at noon, siren resounded over the huge dam and the vast artificial lake that has moistened the local air over the arid desert, marking the official start of power generation of the project.
"Photo taken on Mar. 3, 2009 shows a scene of the Merowe Dam in Merowe, Sudan, Mar. 3, 2009. (Xinhua/Zhai Xi)"
The 9.7-km dam is the longest one in the world with a total capacity of 1.25 million kilowatt, twice as much as Sudan's existing power supply.
Wielding his stick, encircled by entourages, Bashir danced to the rhythm of a 30-minute folk song on a table on a improvised platform. The president's trademark style was applauded by a crowd, who raised a forest of arms and chanted religious slogans.
"It's an important day and we got it finally," said Rashid in the crowd, who clapped his hands jubilantly in the crowd as the voluble president made statements and danced. "But I have not decided where to go after the dam."
Rashid, in his forties, a veteran driver, who has worked for CCMD JV, a Chinese joint venture that built the dam, for some five years.
"I hope it's not my last drive to Merowe," Rashid said with a little blue earlier on our way to the remote dam, some 450-km north of the capital city Khartoum.
The SUV took a U-turn at an intersection, where scores of people were standing on the roadside of a small town with various banners in their hands.
"This town is a local tourist attraction," Rashid said, "they are advertising for their town and the banner reads 'great place, good price' in Arabic."
A man holding a portrait of Sudanese President Omar al-Beshir (R2, front) attends a ceremony at Merowe Dam in Merowe, Sudan, Mar. 3, 2009. (Xinhua/Zhai Xi)
"CCMD (JV) rebuilt the desert road to Merowe for material transportation, and those people want to make more money because it saves a lot of time for the tourists coming from the capital," he said while flooring the accelerator pedal of the vehicle, which rustled through the strong north wind.
"It's a state-of-the-art project," said Wu Xiguo, chief engineer and deputy manager of the dam. "We won the contract at a much [more] reasonable price and finished it on time."
"The biggest challenge is the climate of Merowe," said Wu, who has got a good tan at the dam in the past six years. "The average temperature is about 40 degrees and some of my friends got malaria in the mosquito-ridden area."
"Another problem is the lack of resources," he added, "We came here in July 2003 and found nothing except the river and the infertile Sahara, so we have to import nearly everything, including toothpaste."
He said that the dam's eight 350-ton super cranes, dubbed "Gate Machine" in their jargon, were all shipped from China.
"But it pays, it will stand on the river for at least 100 years and some 4 million Sudanese people, or more than one-tenth of the total population, will benefit from the dam's irrigation system and power supply," he said.
Editor: Xiong Tong"
----------
From an earlier post: During the past few years, we have seen the pictures of China's proliferating world-class infrastructure. We are now starting to see the beginning of a new era. Other countries have decided that they want to improve their economies with modern infrastructure and they're contracting with China to build their important projects.
"China earns newfound respect with Mashair
By SIRAJ WAHAB | ARAB NEWS
Published: Nov 20, 2010 00:13 Updated: Nov 20, 2010 00:46
"Made in China" is no longer a taboo label, thanks to Mashair railway. (AN photo)
MINA: Perhaps the most notable improvement of Saudi Arabia’s many projects to accommodate Haj pilgrims is the railway that shuttled tens of thousands of people around the holy sites.
As the modern, high-tech trains picked up and dropped off passengers, they created a newfound respect for Chinese-made products and Chinese-engineering prowess. Officials said the multibillion-riyal project that was started last year will about triple its capacity from present levels when completed in 2012. Nonetheless, the rail system has already alleviated vehicular traffic around Mina and made travel for many pilgrims a snap.
The Sino-Saudi relationship has been growing over the last decade as China has sought more fossil fuels to power its economic growth. Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah helped realign the nation’s trade relationships with the implementation of a “Look East” policy, which has fostered imports of heavy machinery and construction equipment as well as consumer goods. China has also raised the quality of its exported goods to fight earlier perceptions that its exports were inferior to products manufactured elsewhere.
“We would go to shopping malls and ask for Made-in-Germany and Made-in-Japan stuff. We would look down upon Made-in-China stuff,” said Suleiman Al-Hatrash, a social-sciences teacher at an Abha college. “We started taking China seriously when we went to the Western countries and saw their shopping malls filled with Made-in-China goods.”
However, the state-of-the-art rail system is changing peoples’ perceptions about China almost as fast as it is whisking passengers around Mina.
“People couldn’t believe their eyes when they saw pilgrims being ferried between the holy sites of Mina, Muzdalifah and Arafat,” said journalist Hadi Fakihi. “Those who rode the train were gushing about its high-tech aspects. China has overnight become a nation to respect and emulate.”
“China has won hearts with this successful project,” said Rashad Husein, vice president of the South Asian Pilgrim Establishment. “It is the first time China has executed such a massive project in the Islamic world. This will not only bring China and the Muslim world closer; this will strengthen the bond between Saudi Arabia and China.”
The technology transfers are not one way. Saudi Aramco, the Kingdom’s national oil company, has lent refining expertise and resources to oil and petrochemical projects in partnership with Chinese companies. Some less tangible things are being exported back to China as well.
Of China’s population of nearly 1.4 billion, about 23 million are Muslims. About 13,000 Chinese Muslims performed Haj this year, which included imams, doctors and government officials. Most of the Chinese railway engineers were not Muslims when they arrived in the Kingdom. A special town was set up for them beyond the jurisdiction of Makkah as the holy city is off-limits to non-Muslims. During the course of the construction of the railway, many of the Chinese engineers embraced Islam.
“That led to even greater love and respect for the Chinese,” said Ali Al-Harithy, a Saudi businessman conducting commerce with China. He said he also was impressed that the new stronger ties with China don’t seem to be disruptive to the Kingdom’s longstanding associations with the United States and Europe.
“It was America that helped the Arab states discover oil, and ever since ties between Saudi Arabia and the United States have been very close,” Al-Harithy said. “For China to create space for itself in this region is phenomenal. This Makkah Metro is world-class, and every single aspect of it was carried out in Chinese factories by Chinese technicians and engineers. It is an engineering marvel. Hats off to the Chinese.”
“‘Made in China’ is no longer a taboo label,” said Sudanese journalist Hassan Ibrahim. 'It has now earned a halo of respectability.'”
Exciting pictures of new China-built Mashair Railway in Saudi Arabia
The 6.5-billion-riyal (1.7 billion dollar), 18-kilometre (11-mile) Al-Mashair rail connects Mecca to Arafat, Muzdalifa and Mina, site of a massive tent city that houses more than one million pilgrims.
Pilgrims on Makkah Metro Mashair!
การทดสอบรถไฟ Mashair Railway ที่ซาอุเตรียมไว้บริการฮุจญาต
Trains will move at speeds between 80 and 120 km/hour.
A man stands watching the newly-opened Holy Sites metro light-rail in the western Saudi city of Mecca on November 2.
The railway will reduce the time it takes for pilgrims to move from Arafat to Muzdalifah to five minutes on the 9th of Dul Hijjah. It will also take pilgrims five minutes to move from Muzdalifah to Mina on the 10th.
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"KiwiRail's locos chug in from China
Sandra Conchie | 22nd November 2010
The first six of Kiwirail's 20 new DL class locomotive engines were unloaded at the Port of Tauranga yesterday, an occasion anxiously anticipated and welcomed by all those involved with the almost $80 million project.
Vessel Beluga Foresight delivered its special cargo from China to the Port of Tauranga on Friday and the double-cab diesel locomotives, each weighing nearly 108 tonnes, were transported to the Norske Skog marshalling yard yesterday and lifted by cranes on to the railway tracks for closer inspection.
The first six of KiwiRail's 20 new DL class locomotives unloaded at the Port of Tauranga. (Photo / Sam Ackland)
Built by China's Dalian Locomotive and Rolling Stock Company to Kiwirail specifications, they are expected to be in service before Christmas.
They will be used on the Auckland-Hamilton-Tauranga "golden triangle" freight route and also on Bay of Plenty forestry routes.
They have a 2,700kw engine, will be hauling 2,000 tonnes of freight and are expected to be 5 to 10 per cent more fuel efficient than the existing 149 fleet of engines.
Where they can replace two existing locomotives, the fuel saving is expected to reach almost 30 per cent.
A beaming KiwiRail project manager Scott Murray said the locomotives would undergo a thorough inspection and testing process in preparation for their commissioning before Christmas, including testing the braking system, stopping performance and the load pulling power.
Mr Murray said the new locomotives were the start of some significant investment by KiwiRail in its rolling stock and would have a huge impact on the turnaround capacity of freight haulage.
He said it was part of the company's strategic plan to grow the business and start to retire some of its old engines.
These are the first locomotives to have arrived in the country in nearly 35 years - the newest diesel locomotives in the current fleet are more than 34 years old and the oldest 45 years.
Chief designer Maoye Cong was on hand to make a closer inspection on Friday, followed by a special blessing by locomotive engineer Ricky Kura who has worked for KiwiRail for 34 years.
Mr Cong, who headed a team of 30 designers and worked closely with KiwiRail representatives on the design specifications, said it had been a challenging project, particularly because of the cultural and language differences but one he was very proud to be involved with.
"It's just like waiting to seeing a baby being born. Now it has arrived, it's very exciting."
Noting the first locomotive engine was number 9008 - the nine in Chinese symbolising longevity and eight meaning prosperity, also raised quite a few smiles among the KiwiRail staff.
Mr Murray said the remaining 14 locomotives in the $80 million purchase were due to arrive early next year and will deployed around the North Island."
Note: Thank you to "Schumacher" for the post.
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From an earlier post, China's commercial jet airplane export industry is "taking off."
ARJ-21 jets to be delivered starting from 2011
China's Advanced Regional Jet for the 21st Century
"ARJ21 jets to be delivered starting from 2011
13:38, July 22, 2010
China's first ARJ21 regional jet is expected to be delivered in 2011, the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC), which develops domestically-made jumbo jets and sells the ARJ21 aircraft, reported during the Farnborough International Air Show on July 21.
ARJ21 is a new type of short-to-medium-range, turbofan-powered regional jet independently developed by China. It has 70 to 100 seats and a maximum range of 2,000 nautical miles. Designed in accordance with international airworthiness standards, the aircraft can meet requirements such as takeoff and landing in plateau or high-temperature airports.
According to COMAC, the ARJ21 regional jet had its first test flight on Nov. 28, 2008 and has entered the airworthiness certification and certificate application stage. Four ARJ21 regional jets have participated in test flights with a cumulative flight time of more than 600 hours. Confirmed overseas and domestic orders and orders of intent have amounted to 240 and the first aircraft is scheduled to be delivered in 2011.
The pre-sale price of the new ARJ21 regional jet is 27 million to 29 million U.S. dollars, giving the ARJ21 regional jet a price advantage over its peers in the international market.
COMAC also noted that China's jumbo jet project will enter the engineering development phase next year. The suppliers for the project have generally been selected after key suppliers of the airframe structure, power units and system devices, materials and standard components were fixed.
Equipment for the C919 jumbo jets will be supplied by 13 international aviation manufacturing enterprises. Meanwhile, over 30 domestic enterprises have passed the preliminary material supply reviews and more than 50 domestic enterprises have been selected as potential standard component suppliers.
COMAC added that the overall technical plan, manufacturing plan and customer service plan for the C919 jumbo jets will be compiled in 2010. The C919 jumbo jets are scheduled to conduct the first test flights in 2014 and be delivered in 2016.
By People's Daily Online"
ARJ-21 cockpit
ARJ-21 pilot controls
ARJ-21 interior cabin space
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From one of my earlier posts: China's SANY has thriving American, European, Indian, and Latin American subsidiaries. SANY is "a global corporation with five industrial parks in China, four R&D and manufacturing bases in America, Germany, India and Brazil, and 24 sales companies around the world. Currently, Sany employs over 53,000 people in more than 120 countries."
SANY launches Asia's largest crawler crane
SANY Heavy Industry 1,180-ton crawler crane SCC11800. "SCC11800 crawler crane has a maximum lifting capacity of 1180 tons; the equivalent of lifting six [fully-loaded] Boeing 747 aircraft" (e.g. 88 tons empty weight per Boeing 747).
November 27, 2009 The special-engineering company in Guangdong, with SANY SCC9000-type 900-ton crawler crane, successfully lifts the dome into place at Ningde Nuclear Power Station 1000MW nuclear power plant No. 1.
"Sany launches Asia's largest crawler crane. (News roundup)
Article from: Cranes Today | March 1, 2008
SHANGHAI SANY SCIENCE & Technology Co, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sany Group, is launching a crawler crane with a maximum lifting capacity of 900t (and a maximum load-moment of 13,500 tm), which it claims is the largest-capacity crawler ever made by an Asian company.
In the past, large crawler cranes have only been available in China as imports, but over the last few years Chinese manufacturers have rolled out larger and larger crawlers. Shanghai Sany said its goal is "to fully replace the import of crawler cranes and enter the international market."
In superlift configuration, the crane can lift 900t at 7m radius (and out to 12m), and 800t to 17m. In this …"
"About SANY America
SANY Group Company Ltd. was established in 1989 in China. SANY is the largest heavy equipment manufacturer in China, and also one of the top 10 heavy equipment manufacturers in the world. SANY employs more than 30,000 employees worldwide.
SANY Heavy Industry, a core entity of SANY Group, is a publicly traded company listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange. SANY Group has had an annual growth rate of 50% for the past 10 years. Despite the impact of global economy recession in 2008 and 2009, SANY Group maintained a 50% annual growth rate and achieved $3 billion in sales revenue.
As one of the overseas subsidiaries of Sany Heavy Industry Company, Sany America Inc. was founded in 2006. This North American headquarters is located in Peachtree City, Georgia.
September 12, 2007 Sany Heavy Industry signed an investment deal with the State of Georgia. According to this agreement, Sany shall invest in 228 acres and over $100 million to create and establish a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility; constructing and engineering Sany products to be competitive both in price and quality for all of North America. We have broken ground on phase one of our facility and estimate completion in the second half of 2011. The first phase on construction will consist of a 360,000 square foot manufacturing facility as well as 3 stories of office area totaling 180,000 square feet. With an expected 300 employees by the third year, SANY America will focus on R&D, assembly, marketing and sales of our Truck Mounted Concrete Pumps, Stackers, Handlers, Motor Graders, Drilling Rigs, Excavators and Hydraulic Crawler Cranes which will begin production soon after the completion of our manufacturing facility.
With pride we integrate global resources to provide our customers with excellent equipment and services with unique advantages in cost, performance and localized manufacture, localized management and localized services. At Sany America, we are committed to the North American Market and bringing our customers a successful and outstanding product."
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Bolivia Agrees To Buy $300 Million Communications Satellite From China
China designed, built, and helped finance a communications satellite for Nigeria. It was launched from Sichuan Province in China on May 14, 2007. (Li Gang/Xinhua, via Associated Press)
The successful launch of Nigcomsat-1, a communications satellite for Nigeria, was celebrated at the launch center in Xichang, China. (Li Gang/Xinhua via Newscom)
DFH-4 satellite bus (or platform) designed and built by CGWIC (i.e. China Great Wall Industrial Corporation)
DFH-4 satellite technical specifications
"Bolivia Agrees To Buy $300 Million Communications Satellite From China
Dec 13, 2010
Dow Jones Newswires
BUENOS AIRES -(Dow Jones)- The Bolivian government has signed a contract with China Great Wall Industries Corporation, or Cgwic, to purchase a $300 million communications satellite, Bolivia's state news agency ABI reported Monday.
The satellite, dubbed the Tupac Katari, after the Aymara Indian rebel leader in the late 1700's, is expected to be operational within the next 36 months. The Bolivian government will pay $45 million for the satellite, with the rest financed by a loan from the China Development Bank, according to ABI.
The satellite will have an useful life of 15 years and will bring communications coverage to all of Bolivia, as well as neighboring countries, ABI said.
Cgwic was established in 1980 and is controlled by the government's China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.
-By Shane Romig, Dow Jones Newswires; 54-11-4103-6738; [email protected]"
Last edited:
Hendrik_2000
Lieutenant General
Martian
thanks for posting interesting article on 5 axis CNC machine I have been following this news for years now .It was really Ironic that now China and Taiwan are the biggest CNC machinery. As you know 5 Axis CNC machinery are strategic tool to developed important Military machine part like Turbine blade and quiet propeller.
For long time China cannot import this items because they are on embargo list. The western country hope by doing this they can retard or completely stopped the China's technological progress. But by doing that they invariably shoot themselves in the foot and at the same it does nothing in stopping or retarding the technology progress in China. How can you stopped a rising sun?
IV. Export Controls
A. Export Administration Regulations
Five axis machine tools are controlled by the EAR under 2B001.b.2 (mills) and 2B001.c.2 (grinders). Both ECCN controls derive from Category 2 of the Wassenaar Arrangement’s Lists of Dual-Use Goods and Technologies and from Part 2 of the Nuclear Suppliers Group Guidelines, Transfers of Nuclear-Related Dual-Use Equipment, Material, and Related Technology. Exports of these machine tools are controlled for NS, NP, and AT reasons and no license exceptions apply. Table a below contains a list of countries that do not require a license for these items based on these controls (i.e., NS 2, NP 1, and AT).
As late as 96 there was a case where exporter was fined for exporting CNC machine to China and their licence maybe revoked
Order Sections
Date Cases Charges Violated Respondents Result
----- ----- ------- -------- ----------- ------
10/02/96 In the Matter
of Yuchai
America
Corporation
Attempted to export to the
People's Republic of China
two 5-axis CNC machining
centers without applying for
or obtaining the required
validated export license;
made false and misleading
statement of material fact on
export control document
787.3(a) [1]
787.5(a) [1]
Yuchai America
Corporation
Settlement agreement - civil
penalty of $200,000
The BIS quotes the Export Compliance Working Group of the American Chamber of Commerce in the People's Republic of China as saying: "Given the existing domestic and joint venture development and the foreign availability of high-level machine tools, U.S. companies could not make a material contribution to China's military development. China's military demands are already satisfied by domestic and foreign supply."
The United States exported 515 five-axis machine tools between 2005-2007, and only 12 of these went to China. DMTG, China's largest producer of machine tools, exports products to more than 100 countries.
The Bureau of Industry and Security is in charge of licensing the sale of five-axis machine tools for export. From 2004 to 2007, it issued licenses for the sale of 148 machines, but only 34 of them were sold and delivered. BIS asked the U.S. producers and distributors who applied for the export licenses why so few of the orders were fulfilled. "Many respondents indicated that the customer cancelled the sale after the export license was obtained or bought a competitor's product," says BIS. "One Chinese customer cancelled a sale because it took the U.S. company seven months to obtain an export license, and in the end, the license conditions were too extreme in the customer's view."
The number of licenses issued for export of five-axis machine tools to China dropped from nine in 2006 to only three in 2007. "As one exporter noted, 'the costs associated with the uncertainty of obtaining a license [and] the protracted process and impact on customer relations offset the financial rewards of pursuing the [five-axis] business.' "
thanks for posting interesting article on 5 axis CNC machine I have been following this news for years now .It was really Ironic that now China and Taiwan are the biggest CNC machinery. As you know 5 Axis CNC machinery are strategic tool to developed important Military machine part like Turbine blade and quiet propeller.
For long time China cannot import this items because they are on embargo list. The western country hope by doing this they can retard or completely stopped the China's technological progress. But by doing that they invariably shoot themselves in the foot and at the same it does nothing in stopping or retarding the technology progress in China. How can you stopped a rising sun?
IV. Export Controls
A. Export Administration Regulations
Five axis machine tools are controlled by the EAR under 2B001.b.2 (mills) and 2B001.c.2 (grinders). Both ECCN controls derive from Category 2 of the Wassenaar Arrangement’s Lists of Dual-Use Goods and Technologies and from Part 2 of the Nuclear Suppliers Group Guidelines, Transfers of Nuclear-Related Dual-Use Equipment, Material, and Related Technology. Exports of these machine tools are controlled for NS, NP, and AT reasons and no license exceptions apply. Table a below contains a list of countries that do not require a license for these items based on these controls (i.e., NS 2, NP 1, and AT).
As late as 96 there was a case where exporter was fined for exporting CNC machine to China and their licence maybe revoked
Order Sections
Date Cases Charges Violated Respondents Result
----- ----- ------- -------- ----------- ------
10/02/96 In the Matter
of Yuchai
America
Corporation
Attempted to export to the
People's Republic of China
two 5-axis CNC machining
centers without applying for
or obtaining the required
validated export license;
made false and misleading
statement of material fact on
export control document
787.3(a) [1]
787.5(a) [1]
Yuchai America
Corporation
Settlement agreement - civil
penalty of $200,000
The BIS quotes the Export Compliance Working Group of the American Chamber of Commerce in the People's Republic of China as saying: "Given the existing domestic and joint venture development and the foreign availability of high-level machine tools, U.S. companies could not make a material contribution to China's military development. China's military demands are already satisfied by domestic and foreign supply."
The United States exported 515 five-axis machine tools between 2005-2007, and only 12 of these went to China. DMTG, China's largest producer of machine tools, exports products to more than 100 countries.
The Bureau of Industry and Security is in charge of licensing the sale of five-axis machine tools for export. From 2004 to 2007, it issued licenses for the sale of 148 machines, but only 34 of them were sold and delivered. BIS asked the U.S. producers and distributors who applied for the export licenses why so few of the orders were fulfilled. "Many respondents indicated that the customer cancelled the sale after the export license was obtained or bought a competitor's product," says BIS. "One Chinese customer cancelled a sale because it took the U.S. company seven months to obtain an export license, and in the end, the license conditions were too extreme in the customer's view."
The number of licenses issued for export of five-axis machine tools to China dropped from nine in 2006 to only three in 2007. "As one exporter noted, 'the costs associated with the uncertainty of obtaining a license [and] the protracted process and impact on customer relations offset the financial rewards of pursuing the [five-axis] business.' "
Last edited:
AssassinsMace
Lieutenant General
Does anyone know the status of Chinese computer chip production? I remember the big thing a decade ago was preventing China from obtaining and producing "x" millimeter size wafers. Haven't heard anything of it since.
Martian
Senior Member
Godson: China shuns US silicon with faux x86 superchip
"Godson: China shuns US silicon with faux x86 superchip
Who needs GPU co-processors?
By Timothy Prickett Morgan
Posted in HPC, 25th February 2011 21:07 GMT
ISSCC If the Chinese government is scaring the world with its hybrid CPU-GPU clusters, what do you think the reaction will be when Chinese supercomputers shun American-made x64 processors and GPU co-processors and start using their own energy-efficient, MIPS-derived, x86-emulating Godson line of 64-bit processors?
Apoplexy? Disbelief? A polite bow of respect? A bunch of orders for Godson chips is more likely, once you see what China is up to.
One of the more interesting presentations at this week's International Solid-State Circuits Conference, hosted by the IEEE in San Francisco, was by Weiwu Hu, the lead designer of the Godson family of processors being created by Institute of Computing Technology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
China started developing its own processor since 2002, explained Hu, and the Godson family of chips, which is based on the MIPS architecture created by Silicon Graphics, is part of a holistic technology investment program. The Godson chip effort is one of 16 different projects, in fact, that are each funded with between $5bn and $10bn.
The massive projects focus on specific technology areas that China reckons are key for its technological independence and economic future, including processors and operating systems, chip process technology, 4G wireless networks, nuclear fission power plants, water pollution control and treatment, aircraft design and construction, high-resolution satellite imaging, and manned spaceflight and lunar exploration.
As El Reg reported a year ago when China's ICT was bragging about its plans to build a petaflops-scale supercomputer with server maker Dawning, ICT originally got access to MIPS technology through its partnership with wafer-baker STMicroelectronics. But in June 2009, as it got serious about its Godson chips (also known by the name Loongson) it licensed the MIPS32 and MIPS64 architectures straight from MIPS Technologies, the chip-designing division of Silicon Graphics that was spun out in an initial public offering in 1998.
The initial Godson-1 processors were 32-bit chips running at a mere 266 MHz, and the Godson-2 moved to 64-bits and was revved up to 1.2 GHz. With the Godson-2F chip in 2007 and 2008, ICT came out with a design that has a four-issue core running at 800 MHz, rated at 3.2 gigaflops. The Godson-3A chip was delayed nearly a year and was aimed solely at servers. ICT shifted a four-core design and also did something else very clever: it added x64 instruction emulation right into the hardware. Hu only alluded to this emulation capability, but as El Reg explained a year ago, the Godson-3 chips have instructions added to help the QEMU hypervisor (the one that's at the heart of Red Hat's KVM hypervisor) to translate instructions from x86 to MIPS format. According to early benchmarks, the emulation penalty is about 30 per cent.
ICT's Godson family of chips for servers, PCs, and consumer electronics
The Godson-3A chip was implemented in a 65 nanometer process and ran at 1 GHz to deliver 16 gigaflops of floating point oomph. The chip has 425 million transistors, an area of 174.5 square millimeters, and burned only 10 watts under load. The chip included two 16-bit HyperTransport ports (licensed from Advanced Micro Devices), 4 MB of L2 cache, and two on-chip memory controllers that support either DDR2 or DDR3 main memory.
Oh Godson!
With the Godson-3B, which is what Hu was there to talk about in San Francisco, ICT is sticking with the same 65 nanometer CMOS process and running the chip at the same 1 GHz. But the chip is bumped up to eight cores from four and has two 256-bit vector co-processors per core. The chip has two HyperTransport ports and two DDR3 memory controllers, and weighs in at 583 million transistors in a 300 square millimeter area. Running at 1 GHz, peak performance on those vector units is 128 gigaflops, with the chip only emitting 40 watts. According to early tests, the cores burn about 28.9 watts, while the uncore parts of the chip (HT, memory controllers, and crossbar switches for linking chips together) consume 11.1 watts.
According to Hu, the vector extension unit in the Godson-3B and Godson-2H processors have 128-entry, 256-bit register files and have more than 300 SIMD instructions that have been added to the MIPS architecture.
Here's what the Godson-3B chip looks like:
ICT's Godson-3B MIPS processor, x86 emulation included
The Godson-3B processor will be used in the Dawning 6000 petaflops supercomputer, which China will be tweaking in 2012. Here's an early version of the blade equipped for the Godson-3B chips:
Dawning's two-socket Godson-3A and Godson-3B blade server
And this is what the blade server chassis looks like for the Dawning 6000:
The Dawning 6000 supercomputer blade server chassis
The Dawning 6000 blade design is used by the National Supercomputing Center in Shenzhen for its hybrid Xeon 5650-Nvidia M2050 system, which ranked number three on the Top 500 list from November 2010. That machine had an aggregate 1.27 petaflops of sustained performance running the Linpack Fortran benchmark test.
Another Dawning 6000 blade cluster with 3,000 of the Godson-3B chips, and rated at around 300 sustained teraflops, is expected to be up and running this summer, Hu said. (That would be about 384 peak theoretical teraflops just counting the vector units, not the cores.)
Those Dawning 6000 blades are by no means the highest density that ICT can come up with. Check out this system board for a 1U rack server that Hu showed off at ISSCC this week:
ICT's 1U2T Godson-3B system board
This IU2T system board packs 16 of the eight-core Godson-3B processors onto a single board, rated at 2 teraflops. So a rack of these puppies would yield 42 teraflops. So instead of hundreds of cabinets to reach 1 petaflops of raw number-crunching performance, as it can take with big x64-based machines, ICT could, in theory, do it with 24 racks.
ICT is not going to stop here. The Godson-3C design will shift to a 28 nanometer process and will come in eight-core variants like the Godson-3B as well as a 16-core variant. The Godson-3C will have faster clock speeds, too, running at between 1.5 GHz and 2 GHz. The roadmap says the chip is also capable of expanding up to 16 cores, too. ICT says the Godson-3C will deliver 512 gigaflops of raw performance on math work, and the way the math works, that is twice as much math moving from 1 GHz to 2 GHz and then a doubling again as the core count goes from 8 to 16. This chip is expected sometime around late 2012 or early 2013.
Wouldn't it be funny if Silicon Graphics started building systems with these Godson-3 chips? They could dust off Irix and take it out for a spin on some new iron and allow it to run x64-based Linux applications in emulation mode."
----------
"China's Homemade Supercomputer May be the Most Efficient Ever
Technology Review
Published by MIT
Christopher Mims 03/01/2011
As processors hit the power wall, performance per watt means everything.
China's home-grown supercomputer, the Dawning 6000, finally has a launch date: Summer 2011. In terms of raw performance, the machine is not going to be a record breaker, but it will be the first machine in the Top500 to be powered entirely by chips designed entirely by China's Institute of Computing Technology. Long term, they could be a major threat to Intel, AMD, NVIDIA and their ilk.
Dawning 6000 chassis with 10 Godson 3B-powered blade servers installed
Weiwu Hu, lead architect of the Loongson line of chips, announced the launch of the forthcoming supercomputer at the International Solid State Circuits Conference held last week. (Technology Review has been covering the development of this supercomputer for over a year, since the first intimation of its construction in January 2010.)
What's new as of Hu's latest announcement is the scale of the machine: 300 teraflops, achieved with 3,000 of the 1-Ghz, 8-core Godson 3B chips. That's a far cry from the #1 position on the world's list of the top 500 supercomputers, currently occupied by the 2.56 petaflop Tianhe-1A machine, also built in China, but with Intel CPUs and NVIDIA GPUs.
The absolute power of the machine might not matter much, however, because as the platform matures, performance per watt will become the dominant metric, as it has for all other high performance systems (and even the chips in your laptop and cell phone). As HPC Wire reports, "[T]he Godson-3B appears to be a very power-efficient design, and the upcoming Dawning machine could rival even Blue Gene/Q systems for performance per watt supremacy."
This efficiency is achieved because of the relatively low clock speed of the Godson 3B -- only 1.0 GHz -- and the chips reliance on the MIPS architecture, which is also used in set-top boxes and is making its way into the smartphone market.
Significantly, in June 2010 the Chinese government was rumored to be contemplating the purchase of a 20 percent stake in MIPS Technologies, holder of the rights to the MIPS instruction set.
Hu also announced the launch in 2012 or 2013 of the Godson 3C chip, which at twice the clock speed and twice the cores of the 3B, will be four times as fast. This chip will be used to build a petascale supercomputer. Were such system to debut today, it would likely be among the ten fastest supercomputers on earth."
"Godson: China shuns US silicon with faux x86 superchip
Who needs GPU co-processors?
By Timothy Prickett Morgan
Posted in HPC, 25th February 2011 21:07 GMT
ISSCC If the Chinese government is scaring the world with its hybrid CPU-GPU clusters, what do you think the reaction will be when Chinese supercomputers shun American-made x64 processors and GPU co-processors and start using their own energy-efficient, MIPS-derived, x86-emulating Godson line of 64-bit processors?
Apoplexy? Disbelief? A polite bow of respect? A bunch of orders for Godson chips is more likely, once you see what China is up to.
One of the more interesting presentations at this week's International Solid-State Circuits Conference, hosted by the IEEE in San Francisco, was by Weiwu Hu, the lead designer of the Godson family of processors being created by Institute of Computing Technology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
China started developing its own processor since 2002, explained Hu, and the Godson family of chips, which is based on the MIPS architecture created by Silicon Graphics, is part of a holistic technology investment program. The Godson chip effort is one of 16 different projects, in fact, that are each funded with between $5bn and $10bn.
The massive projects focus on specific technology areas that China reckons are key for its technological independence and economic future, including processors and operating systems, chip process technology, 4G wireless networks, nuclear fission power plants, water pollution control and treatment, aircraft design and construction, high-resolution satellite imaging, and manned spaceflight and lunar exploration.
As El Reg reported a year ago when China's ICT was bragging about its plans to build a petaflops-scale supercomputer with server maker Dawning, ICT originally got access to MIPS technology through its partnership with wafer-baker STMicroelectronics. But in June 2009, as it got serious about its Godson chips (also known by the name Loongson) it licensed the MIPS32 and MIPS64 architectures straight from MIPS Technologies, the chip-designing division of Silicon Graphics that was spun out in an initial public offering in 1998.
The initial Godson-1 processors were 32-bit chips running at a mere 266 MHz, and the Godson-2 moved to 64-bits and was revved up to 1.2 GHz. With the Godson-2F chip in 2007 and 2008, ICT came out with a design that has a four-issue core running at 800 MHz, rated at 3.2 gigaflops. The Godson-3A chip was delayed nearly a year and was aimed solely at servers. ICT shifted a four-core design and also did something else very clever: it added x64 instruction emulation right into the hardware. Hu only alluded to this emulation capability, but as El Reg explained a year ago, the Godson-3 chips have instructions added to help the QEMU hypervisor (the one that's at the heart of Red Hat's KVM hypervisor) to translate instructions from x86 to MIPS format. According to early benchmarks, the emulation penalty is about 30 per cent.
ICT's Godson family of chips for servers, PCs, and consumer electronics
The Godson-3A chip was implemented in a 65 nanometer process and ran at 1 GHz to deliver 16 gigaflops of floating point oomph. The chip has 425 million transistors, an area of 174.5 square millimeters, and burned only 10 watts under load. The chip included two 16-bit HyperTransport ports (licensed from Advanced Micro Devices), 4 MB of L2 cache, and two on-chip memory controllers that support either DDR2 or DDR3 main memory.
Oh Godson!
With the Godson-3B, which is what Hu was there to talk about in San Francisco, ICT is sticking with the same 65 nanometer CMOS process and running the chip at the same 1 GHz. But the chip is bumped up to eight cores from four and has two 256-bit vector co-processors per core. The chip has two HyperTransport ports and two DDR3 memory controllers, and weighs in at 583 million transistors in a 300 square millimeter area. Running at 1 GHz, peak performance on those vector units is 128 gigaflops, with the chip only emitting 40 watts. According to early tests, the cores burn about 28.9 watts, while the uncore parts of the chip (HT, memory controllers, and crossbar switches for linking chips together) consume 11.1 watts.
According to Hu, the vector extension unit in the Godson-3B and Godson-2H processors have 128-entry, 256-bit register files and have more than 300 SIMD instructions that have been added to the MIPS architecture.
Here's what the Godson-3B chip looks like:
ICT's Godson-3B MIPS processor, x86 emulation included
The Godson-3B processor will be used in the Dawning 6000 petaflops supercomputer, which China will be tweaking in 2012. Here's an early version of the blade equipped for the Godson-3B chips:
Dawning's two-socket Godson-3A and Godson-3B blade server
And this is what the blade server chassis looks like for the Dawning 6000:
The Dawning 6000 supercomputer blade server chassis
The Dawning 6000 blade design is used by the National Supercomputing Center in Shenzhen for its hybrid Xeon 5650-Nvidia M2050 system, which ranked number three on the Top 500 list from November 2010. That machine had an aggregate 1.27 petaflops of sustained performance running the Linpack Fortran benchmark test.
Another Dawning 6000 blade cluster with 3,000 of the Godson-3B chips, and rated at around 300 sustained teraflops, is expected to be up and running this summer, Hu said. (That would be about 384 peak theoretical teraflops just counting the vector units, not the cores.)
Those Dawning 6000 blades are by no means the highest density that ICT can come up with. Check out this system board for a 1U rack server that Hu showed off at ISSCC this week:
ICT's 1U2T Godson-3B system board
This IU2T system board packs 16 of the eight-core Godson-3B processors onto a single board, rated at 2 teraflops. So a rack of these puppies would yield 42 teraflops. So instead of hundreds of cabinets to reach 1 petaflops of raw number-crunching performance, as it can take with big x64-based machines, ICT could, in theory, do it with 24 racks.
ICT is not going to stop here. The Godson-3C design will shift to a 28 nanometer process and will come in eight-core variants like the Godson-3B as well as a 16-core variant. The Godson-3C will have faster clock speeds, too, running at between 1.5 GHz and 2 GHz. The roadmap says the chip is also capable of expanding up to 16 cores, too. ICT says the Godson-3C will deliver 512 gigaflops of raw performance on math work, and the way the math works, that is twice as much math moving from 1 GHz to 2 GHz and then a doubling again as the core count goes from 8 to 16. This chip is expected sometime around late 2012 or early 2013.
Wouldn't it be funny if Silicon Graphics started building systems with these Godson-3 chips? They could dust off Irix and take it out for a spin on some new iron and allow it to run x64-based Linux applications in emulation mode."
----------
"China's Homemade Supercomputer May be the Most Efficient Ever
Technology Review
Published by MIT
Christopher Mims 03/01/2011
As processors hit the power wall, performance per watt means everything.
China's home-grown supercomputer, the Dawning 6000, finally has a launch date: Summer 2011. In terms of raw performance, the machine is not going to be a record breaker, but it will be the first machine in the Top500 to be powered entirely by chips designed entirely by China's Institute of Computing Technology. Long term, they could be a major threat to Intel, AMD, NVIDIA and their ilk.
Dawning 6000 chassis with 10 Godson 3B-powered blade servers installed
Weiwu Hu, lead architect of the Loongson line of chips, announced the launch of the forthcoming supercomputer at the International Solid State Circuits Conference held last week. (Technology Review has been covering the development of this supercomputer for over a year, since the first intimation of its construction in January 2010.)
What's new as of Hu's latest announcement is the scale of the machine: 300 teraflops, achieved with 3,000 of the 1-Ghz, 8-core Godson 3B chips. That's a far cry from the #1 position on the world's list of the top 500 supercomputers, currently occupied by the 2.56 petaflop Tianhe-1A machine, also built in China, but with Intel CPUs and NVIDIA GPUs.
The absolute power of the machine might not matter much, however, because as the platform matures, performance per watt will become the dominant metric, as it has for all other high performance systems (and even the chips in your laptop and cell phone). As HPC Wire reports, "[T]he Godson-3B appears to be a very power-efficient design, and the upcoming Dawning machine could rival even Blue Gene/Q systems for performance per watt supremacy."
This efficiency is achieved because of the relatively low clock speed of the Godson 3B -- only 1.0 GHz -- and the chips reliance on the MIPS architecture, which is also used in set-top boxes and is making its way into the smartphone market.
Significantly, in June 2010 the Chinese government was rumored to be contemplating the purchase of a 20 percent stake in MIPS Technologies, holder of the rights to the MIPS instruction set.
Hu also announced the launch in 2012 or 2013 of the Godson 3C chip, which at twice the clock speed and twice the cores of the 3B, will be four times as fast. This chip will be used to build a petascale supercomputer. Were such system to debut today, it would likely be among the ten fastest supercomputers on earth."
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pugachev_diver
Banned Idiot
If my memory serves me correctly, it is designed in China but the wafers are produced by IT something something, I think it's a joint company between French and Italians.
bladerunner
Banned Idiot
Re: Godson: China shuns US silicon with faux x86 superchip
double post
double post
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bladerunner
Banned Idiot
Why are the numbers all over the place Maybe its to fool the auditors into thinking theres more engines then there actually are.
ttp://www.zacliu.com/20101115/nzr-dl-class/
TMS No.:
DL 9008
DL 9014
DL 9020
DL 9037
DL 9043
DL 9066
DL 9072
DL 9089
DL 9095
DL 9106
DL 9112
DL 9129
DL 9135
DL 9141
DL 9158
DL 9164
DL 9170
DL 9187
DL 9193
DL 9204
ttp://www.zacliu.com/20101115/nzr-dl-class/
TMS No.:
DL 9008
DL 9014
DL 9020
DL 9037
DL 9043
DL 9066
DL 9072
DL 9089
DL 9095
DL 9106
DL 9112
DL 9129
DL 9135
DL 9141
DL 9158
DL 9164
DL 9170
DL 9187
DL 9193
DL 9204
bladerunner
Banned Idiot
I betcha those chinese makers have got their fingers crossed that these engines don't give any trouble as the Namibian experience was one of the reasons for the widespread opposition to the purchasing of the Chinese made engines in N.Z.
[tt_news]=56980&no_cache=1
Chinese locomotives kaput N$36m down the rail
By: BRIGITTE WEIDLICH
THE four Chinese locomotives, which cost about N$36 million and arrived in Namibia five years ago, could be used for only 33 months and suffered 265 failures during that time from October 2004 until June 2007, Parliament was told yesterday.
“This translated into an availability rate of less than 40 per cent,” Works and Transport Minister Helmut Angula said in response to questions posed by Nora Schimming-Chase of the CoD.
“TransNamib grounded all these locomotives in June 2007 due to their poor performance and serious safety risks related to the braking system,” Angula added.
“The decision to buy them was economically justified, but due to a lack of a proper technical analysis of the Chinese manufacturer’s design and a lack of quality control, these locomotives were not suitable for the Namibian environment in which they had to operate.”
In response to Schimming-Chase’s question as to who would pay for these ‘white elephants’, Angula said that TransNamib and the Chinese company had agreed in 2005-06 that the Chinese would rebuild the four locomotives at a cost of US$260 000 (about N$2,6 million.) The Chinese train bought for the route from Windhoek to Ondangwa – the Omugulu GwoMbashe Star – was bought for US$2,3 million (about N$23 million), the Minister told the House.
It was originally intended as a shuttle train between Windhoek and the Hosea Kutako International Airport, but this never materialised.
The train was rerouted to the Windhoek-Walvis Bay route and from July 2006 to the northern route between Windhoek and Ondangwa and ran once a week.
“The Omugulu GwoMbashe Star (OGS) broke down in March 2007 with a broken gearbox casing. As this product was a one-off unit manufactured for TransNamib, such part had to be manufactured in China and arrived in September 2007,” according to Angula.
But the saga did not end there.
During the test run, “the complete gearbox disintegrated”, the Minister added.
Replacement parts arrived 15 months later, at the end of 2008. This time the repairs were completed and the test runs were successful.
“Since the end of 2008, the OGS is running but it does not go to the north,” Angula told the astonished MPs.
“Currently the OGS is catering mainly for business corporate functions and chartered trips.”
In the meantime, TransNamib is analysing the train routes in the country “to determine which route and rail service could best apply in order to utilise the OGS”.
Angula did not say why TransNamib did not do such a study before the OGS came into operation.
[tt_news]=56980&no_cache=1
Chinese locomotives kaput N$36m down the rail
By: BRIGITTE WEIDLICH
THE four Chinese locomotives, which cost about N$36 million and arrived in Namibia five years ago, could be used for only 33 months and suffered 265 failures during that time from October 2004 until June 2007, Parliament was told yesterday.
“This translated into an availability rate of less than 40 per cent,” Works and Transport Minister Helmut Angula said in response to questions posed by Nora Schimming-Chase of the CoD.
“TransNamib grounded all these locomotives in June 2007 due to their poor performance and serious safety risks related to the braking system,” Angula added.
“The decision to buy them was economically justified, but due to a lack of a proper technical analysis of the Chinese manufacturer’s design and a lack of quality control, these locomotives were not suitable for the Namibian environment in which they had to operate.”
In response to Schimming-Chase’s question as to who would pay for these ‘white elephants’, Angula said that TransNamib and the Chinese company had agreed in 2005-06 that the Chinese would rebuild the four locomotives at a cost of US$260 000 (about N$2,6 million.) The Chinese train bought for the route from Windhoek to Ondangwa – the Omugulu GwoMbashe Star – was bought for US$2,3 million (about N$23 million), the Minister told the House.
It was originally intended as a shuttle train between Windhoek and the Hosea Kutako International Airport, but this never materialised.
The train was rerouted to the Windhoek-Walvis Bay route and from July 2006 to the northern route between Windhoek and Ondangwa and ran once a week.
“The Omugulu GwoMbashe Star (OGS) broke down in March 2007 with a broken gearbox casing. As this product was a one-off unit manufactured for TransNamib, such part had to be manufactured in China and arrived in September 2007,” according to Angula.
But the saga did not end there.
During the test run, “the complete gearbox disintegrated”, the Minister added.
Replacement parts arrived 15 months later, at the end of 2008. This time the repairs were completed and the test runs were successful.
“Since the end of 2008, the OGS is running but it does not go to the north,” Angula told the astonished MPs.
“Currently the OGS is catering mainly for business corporate functions and chartered trips.”
In the meantime, TransNamib is analysing the train routes in the country “to determine which route and rail service could best apply in order to utilise the OGS”.
Angula did not say why TransNamib did not do such a study before the OGS came into operation.
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Asymptote
Banned Idiot
5 Axis CNC machines are old news!!
6-9 Axis CNC is where it is at!
Seriously, I read about this like atleast 5-6 years ago - I remember there was a picture of some chinese engineers celebrating their first LARGE SCALE 6 axis CNC machine cutting a very large turbine blade from solid metal block.
Can't find the picture now, but I remember it was talked about on defencetalk.
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