Rebirth of the 1980s: The Military Industry Empire

The reason for collaborating with the East to produce aircraft engines is for the sake of lower costs. If the price is too high, even with 960 Factory's substantial investment, they might abandon the project.

Making money is fine, but don't be exorbitant. Qin Yang is warning them.

After leaving the Benz heavy truck factory, everyone stood outside on the open ground, listening to the Tianjin leaders' introduction that the land allocated to them was right here, covering nine hundred acres. If they felt it wasn't enough, they could apply for more land.

Don't underestimate how desolate it looks now. In the future, it will definitely be built into a modern aircraft engine base!

However, Kenneth and the others seemed to have lost interest. After the tour, they returned to the capital.

Starting construction from scratch would take a long time, easily a year or two. Profits would only come after production. They could only hope that the Yun-10 would complete the twin-engine modification as soon as possible. If the factory wasn't ready by then, they would have to purchase ready-made engines from Rolls-Royce, even if they only sold ten or twenty units first.

Kenneth and his team had several more discussions with the Civil Aviation Administration in the capital before completing their trip and returning to England.

Qin Yang finally felt that he had completed a major task. He left the remaining matters to his subordinates. Construction would have to wait until spring, so he didn't need to worry about it.

He originally wanted to rest for a few days, but unexpectedly, just after returning to the factory, he received good news.

"President Qin, we have news from the Sinotruk joint venture company that the enlarged-cylinder modification based on the Steyr engine is out. After testing, the power has reached 490 horsepower."

"Really?" Qin Yang was immediately excited: "Great! They did a great job! Let's go take a look!"

"The engine has been sent to the 201 Institute."

"Okay, I'll go over right away." Qin Yang was very happy.

Some time ago, everyone held a meeting to discuss the wheeled infantry fighting vehicle. Qin Yang insisted that the engine for this type of vehicle must reach 500 horsepower. However, they couldn't use a tank engine, so Old Zhu suggested developing it based on the Steyr engine, with key components manufactured by 960 Factory.

After giving the order at the time, Qin Yang didn't pay attention to it anymore. After all, he had to deal with major issues now, and these small matters could be handled by the people below. Unexpectedly, they moved so quickly!

The Sinotruk joint venture company was specifically established to undertake the Steyr cooperation project. This company was composed of several domestic heavy-duty truck factories and parts factories, jointly manufacturing Steyr. There were three complete vehicle factories, located in Jinan, Sichuan, and Shaanxi respectively. After these three separated, they each launched their own Steyr products and continued to compete in the market.

At that time, after the introduction, the main engine factory was Weichai, and the main gearbox factory was Shaanxi Gear Factory.

Now, manufacturing this modified engine is of course also Weichai's task.

When Qin Yang arrived at the 201 Institute, an engine had already been placed on their test stand.

The WD615 engine is paired with the Steyr. This engine uses a straight-six cylinder layout, with a cylinder bore of 126 mm and a stroke of 130 mm. Calculated in this way, the total displacement is 9.762 liters. This displacement is very low compared to the engine used in the 59 tank, but it can output two to three hundred horsepower.

Now, continuing to expand the cylinder and increase the displacement based on this engine has resulted in a 500-horsepower diesel engine. The volume of this diesel engine is still much smaller than the 59 tank.

A group of people surrounded the engine, excitedly talking about something.

"Our old 59 tank uses the 12150 engine, with a displacement of 32 liters, and it only has 500 horsepower. Your engine has a displacement of only 12 liters, and it has also achieved 500 horsepower output. It's really too strong!"

"Yes, I think in the future, if we want to improve our 59 tanks, we can directly use this engine. Compared to the past lifespan of 500 motorized hours, this engine can run for at least 20,000 hours!"

"That's right, our engine technology is actually so strong, it's simply unbelievable!"

Listening to everyone's praise, Zhao Zhiqiang, a technical expert from Weichai, was a little embarrassed: "Everyone, actually we didn't change much. The main components above, such as the high-pressure fuel injector, high-pressure oil pump, and supercharged intercooling device, are all manufactured by 960 Factory. We just lengthened the original engine a bit."

"Lengthened? It doesn't look any longer."

"The cylinder is lengthened. The cylinder bore hasn't changed. This kind of modification is the simplest."

If you want to increase power, you have to increase displacement, and to increase displacement, you need to expand the cylinder. At this time, there are two directions: horizontal or vertical development?

Vertically, the stroke is increased, which is the distance the piston moves up and down. The original stroke was 130 mm, but now it has become 155 mm, which means that the internal height has increased by 25 mm, and of course the volume has also increased!

With this increase method, the cylinder center distance does not need to be changed, just the cylinder block needs to be heightened, the matching cylinder liner is lengthened, and the connecting rod and crankshaft are also correspondingly increased. Although they all have to be re-manufactured, it is relatively easier to implement.

Anyway, even if it is expanded horizontally, the piston connecting rod still has to be strengthened.

These tasks were all done by Weichai themselves, but if you want the power of the diesel engine to be increased to 500 horsepower, the more important thing is the turbocharger and oil pump. More and higher pressure oil must be injected, and at the same time, more air must be blown in. These are the most critical, and these are all made by 960 Factory.

960 Factory can even make parts for tank engines, let alone these parts now. The two parties cooperated to create this domestic civilian diesel engine with the largest power.

Although it is only 490 horsepower, everyone rounds up and calls this engine a 500-horsepower engine. This is a new era!

"Without the cooperation of 960 Factory, what we can do is to continue to increase the number of cylinders, but if it becomes an in-line eight-cylinder engine, it looks a bit inappropriate."

There are many layouts for engines. The in-line layout is the most common. The cylinders form a line. The common one is a four-cylinder engine, up to a six-cylinder engine. If there are more, the engine will be too long.

Even for a six-cylinder engine, there are not many in-line layouts. A V-shaped layout is more suitable, which can greatly shorten the length. When it comes to eight cylinders, it is a proper V-shaped structure.

There are many V-shaped engines abroad, but there are none in China. Everyone has not done it before, so they don't know what risks there will be. It is most appropriate to improve this six-cylinder engine now.

Who would have thought that a six-cylinder engine could burst out 500 horsepower? Mercedes-Benz can't do it!

Of course, this is also squeezing the power, and the lifespan will definitely be lower than ordinary commercial vehicle engines, but as long as it is stronger than military ones!

"What are you guys talking about, so happy?" Just at this moment, a voice came from outside.

President Qin is here!