Chapter 242 Dock and docking
Chapter 242 Dock and docking
Minqin County, Gansu Province.
A large area near the western desert is now planted with soybeans.
The soybeans, which had just grown for over a month, had turned the nearby yellow sand into a lush green.
On the open space on the west side near the county town, an industrial zone stretching for more than ten kilometers is under construction non-stop.
In addition to the industrial zone, there are also supporting employee quarters, large water storage stations and other facilities.
As for why such a large industrial facility was built there, on the one hand it was to be close to the source of raw materials, and on the other hand it was to keep it confidential.
Xiansi soybeans are very important, not only within Hailufeng Company, but the government also believes that Xiansi soybeans are related to many strategies. The government fully supports Hailufeng Company's plan to build an isolated industrial zone and planting area in Minqin County.
This support includes changing the industrial structure of Minqin County. Starting next year, Minqin County will no longer allow the planting of crops other than fairy bean soybeans, fairy silk soybeans, and naturally growing forage grasses.
The reason why other crops are not allowed to be planted is to transfer the local agricultural water share to domestic and industrial water, thereby increasing the local population carrying capacity.
You should know that Minqin County currently has a population of only 17, and the local annual available water resources are only 1.2 million cubic meters. After deducting 0.3 million cubic meters of ecological water replenishment, there are still 0.9 million cubic meters left.
You can't have your cake and eat it too.
Since we want to develop industry, we have to sacrifice other local agriculture. Not only is the planting industry not allowed, but even animal husbandry is not allowed to develop, because raising pigs, cattle and sheep requires a lot of fresh water.
As for whether the ban on other agricultural and animal husbandry will lead to local farmers losing their livelihoods, there is no need to worry about this. Local farmers are now either recruited to work on farms or in the service industry in cities.
In the future, the entire Minqin County will develop a series of high-tech industries around Xiansi soybeans.
Including soybean silk cloth, high-strength modified soybean silk fiber materials, composite materials, soybean oil refining, biodiesel refining, high-strength ultra-light parts production, airship manufacturing, etc.
These industries are estimated to require hundreds of thousands of industrial workers, so the living water supply for these people and the industrial water supply for this high-tech industrial park must be guaranteed.
Near the planting area of Xiansi soybeans, a desert isolation zone with a width of more than ten kilometers is specially reserved.
At the edge of the isolation zone, three layers of barbed wire, sentry posts, fire stations, drone shielding towers and an independent monitoring network are planned inside and outside.
These facilities are currently under intensive construction.
Including the crushing plant and the soybean meal preliminary processing plant, all are within this isolation zone.
After all, the value of Xiansi soybeans is too high, much higher than that of Senzu soybeans. The time for foreign forces to obtain Xiansi soybeans must be delayed as much as possible.
As long as the early technology and patents are controlled domestically and the industrial layout is completed, even if foreign countries obtain Xiansi soybeans, they will not be able to threaten Seris in related industries.
Currently, Minqin County has a total of 80 mu of Xiansi soybeans planted, which will increase to 300 million mu next year. The subsequent planting scale will be adjusted according to market changes and industry needs, but the overall planting scale will not be less than 1000 million mu.
This year, 80 mu of soybeans can produce about 8 tons of soybean fiber. After modification, it can produce about 12 tons of high-strength soybean fiber.
In order to promote the development of the soybean silk industrial park in Minqin County, Hailufeng Company borrowed 200 billion yuan in special development funds from local banks and introduced state-owned assets to enhance the overall strength of the entire industry.
In the current shareholding structure of Hailufeng Minqin Development Group, Hailufeng Company holds 51% of the group's shares and management rights, while state-owned assets hold 49% as financial investment and also participate in financial supervision.
Such a huge investment has caused the entire industrial park to spring up like bamboo shoots after a spring rain.
In order to speed up the progress, the number of construction workers in the entire industrial park reached tens of thousands.
In order to support the project to be implemented as soon as possible, the authorities temporarily added a large number of freight high-speed railways to the Lanzhou-Zhangjiakou high-speed railway line, which was just opened this year. The high-speed railways will be used to transport steel bars, cement, various construction materials, and various daily necessities.
This allowed the progress of the entire project to advance at a speed visible to the naked eye.
The first phase of the oil mill and soybean meal processing plant has been completed, and can process 100 million tons of soybeans and 100 million tons of soybean meal annually.
At this time, the airship manufacturing plant invested by Hailufeng Company was also progressing in full swing.
However, this project is not so fast, mainly because the docks for several airships are very large and require completely enclosed indoor docks.
Because these new airships being designed are very large.
Blue Whale 1 has a maximum load capacity of 200 tons, a hydrogen airbag of 27 cubic meters, a length of 275 meters, a diameter of 48 meters, and a maximum take-off weight of 320 tons.
Blue Whale 2 has a maximum load capacity of 500 tons, a hydrogen balloon of 67 cubic meters, a length of 350 meters, a diameter of 60 meters, and a maximum take-off weight of 800 tons.
Blue Whale 3 has a maximum load capacity of 2000 tons, a hydrogen balloon of 270 cubic meters, a length of 580 meters, a diameter of 100 meters, and a maximum take-off weight of 3200 tons.
These are the three types of airships that the Hailufeng Airship Manufacturing Plant is currently designing.
Due to different processes, in order to ensure the maximum strength of the airship skeleton, the skeleton must be woven and then modified so that the airship skeleton can be formed in one piece to avoid structural defects in the skeleton.
Only by manufacturing the airship skeleton in this way can we ensure that the airship's own weight is compressed to the maximum extent and its payload is increased.
The length is not a big problem; the key is the height and width created by the diameter.
For example, the Blue Whale 3 has a diameter of 100 meters. With the cargo rack and automatic driving chamber at the bottom, the height is about 105 meters. With the height and width redundancy of the construction area, the width and height of the entire dock must be at least 150 meters.
This large-span upper dome structure places great pressure on the construction difficulty and material strength of the building.
Consider the cost issue.
Hailufeng Company did not use traditional steel structures and steel cables, nor did it use carbon fiber. Instead, it planned to use modified soybean silk fiber.
The foundation and pedestal of the lower layer are constructed with reinforced concrete, while the walls and frames of the upper portion are made of soybean fiber composite materials, with internal and external fire-retardant coatings and an outer UV-proof coating.
After precise calculations, the design team responsible for designing this dock found that after adopting the new material, the weight of the upper part of this indoor airship dock would be reduced by about 80%, and the overall cost of the factory building could be reduced by about 60%.
The reason why the construction cost has been reduced so much is that the upper part of the structure is 80% lighter. As a result, the weight that the foundation needs to bear is also reduced by 80%. There must be huge differences in the construction costs of foundations with different bearing weights.
The production cost of Hailufeng's modified soybean silk fiber is about 8000 yuan per ton. In composite materials, the addition amount of modified soybean silk fiber is generally between 30% and 80%.
The ex-factory price of new material building components of Hailufeng Minqin Group is 2 yuan per ton, and the gross profit per ton is around 1.2 to 1.4 yuan.
This price is not high. Traditional large-span steel products cost four to five thousand yuan per ton.
Moreover, the high strength of the new material allows the components to be made very light, which is conducive to transportation, loading and unloading and installation.
If it is traditional high-strength steel, even if the steel mill is willing to manufacture large-span integrated components, it is estimated that there will be few cranes that can lift them.
The one-piece component made of new materials is about 80% lighter than steel components of the same proportion, and can be operated by small cranes.
However, at this stage, the component factory of Hailufeng Minqin Group has not been completed and the raw materials have not been grown. Therefore, the upper part of the airship dock can only be produced and installed after the local Xiansi soybeans are harvested in September.
at the same time.
The bean thread laboratory at the Hailufeng Company headquarters has been working overtime these days to produce a lot of modified bean thread fibers, fabrics, components and the like using the Xiansi soybeans harvested from the experimental fields in the second quarter.
In a town in Lufeng.
The company set up a temporary airship experimental base here.
More than 50 aviation engineers, airship designers and technicians recently recruited from all over the country are assembling a large airship in the open air.
Jiang Miao also came here to investigate.
Wan Gaofeng, general manager of Hailufeng Airship Company, Hou Xin, technical director, and Yang Yuanzhen, head of Dousi Laboratory, are all here.
This site was previously an abandoned quarry. Jiang Miao and others stood halfway up the mountain and could overlook the quarry valley. There were several large tower cranes set up inside the valley, as well as several cranes of different specifications for hoisting auxiliary components.
"Boss, the keel of Experiment No. 1 has been laid, and we have installed all the airbags. The customized hydrogen liquefied storage tanks and inflation and exhaust equipment are in place." Hou Xin, technical director of the airship company and designer of the Blue Whale airship, introduced the progress of each item in detail.
"Is it ready for testing now?" Jiang Miao asked this because Wan Gaofeng, general manager of the airship company, invited him to participate in the test flight ceremony two days ago.
Hou Xin nodded: "It's OK. With the frame and airbags, plus part of the control system, we can test it. The rest of the skin and electric propellers will be tested later."
Hearing this, Jiang Miao also reacted: "In other words, today we are mainly testing the payload?"
"Yes, boss."
"Judging from the current situation, it will take another hour or two, right?" Jiang Miao estimated the situation at the scene.
“Yes, after all, it takes some time to fill 270 million cubic meters of hydrogen.”
Jiang Miao picked up the telescope and looked at the valley about one kilometer away, where inflation was taking place. Dozens of high-power industrial fans and pipes inside the valley were continuously providing ventilation.
Obviously Hou Xin was very aware of the power of 270 million cubic meters of hydrogen. If an explosion was accidentally caused, the power would be equivalent to more than tons of TNT.
Therefore, they strengthened ventilation to prevent hydrogen from accumulating too much at the bottom of the valley after leakage, causing the concentration to reach the critical point of explosion.
A number of hydrogen concentration detectors have been installed in advance on the valley bottom and the airship frame, and several staff members are keeping a close eye on the feedback data from these detectors.
Behind this observation platform halfway up the mountain is an explosion-proof shelter built using a natural cave.
This is also the reason why the experimental base was set up in the valley. There are relatively few residents in this area. Hailufeng Company has paid dozens of local villagers to move to other places because of concerns about hydrogen explosions.
Time passes minute by minute.
Two hours passed by unknowingly.
The staff member in charge of monitoring the progress of the airbag inflation reported to Hou Xin: "Director Hou, inflation is complete. The current hydrogen concentration in the skeleton does not exceed the set value and is within the safe range."
"Very good, continue monitoring." Hou Xin picked up the intercom: "Counterweight team, please reply."
"Weight team received."
"The counterweight team is executing Test Plan No. 1 as originally planned."
"Weight team received."
Several staff members from the counterweight team connected the airship's shelf cables to the containers underneath.
A total of 50 containers are connected, each weighing 20 tons, adding up to a total of 1000 tons.
"Director Hou, the counterweight connection is complete."
"Recheck the connections."
"Yes."
After half an hour.
"Director Hou, the inspection is complete and the connection meets the requirements."
"Evacuate."
As the counterweight team evacuated.
"Evacuation completed."
"Got it." Hou Xin immediately ordered: "The fixed team began to release the mooring cables in an orderly manner."
"Fixed team received."
The eight mooring cables were loosened little by little, the airship began to float upward, and the 8-ton counterweight also slowly followed upward.
Jiang Miao used his telescope to look at the skeleton underneath the airship, especially the load-bearing beams. He did not feel any pressure from the weight of thousands of tons.
In the telescope lens, the load-bearing beam did not show any obvious deformation, which obviously did not exceed its bearing limit.
The detectors installed on these load-bearing beams did not detect any severe deformation data.
Testing continues.
The staff continued to increase the weight of the counterweight to test whether the 270 million cubic meters of hydrogen airbags had a payload of 2000 tons.
Three hours later, the weight of the counterweight finally exceeded 2000 tons, but the configuration team continued to increase the configuration because the counterweight also needed to take into account the weight of the later skin, autopilot cabin, electric propeller, auxiliary control equipment, battery box, etc.
It was not until the total weight of the experimental airship reached 3250 tons that the airship was pressed near the ground by the counterweight and could no longer float up.
However, when the total weight of the airship is reduced to 3150 tons, it will continue to float upwards. Obviously, this is basically consistent with the designed floating critical point of 3200 tons.
After receiving the fresh test data, Hou Xin reported the situation to Jiang Miao: "Boss, the maximum load-bearing capacity is basically in line with expectations. When floating to an altitude of 1000 meters, the airship's payload dropped by about 11% due to the decrease in air density. If we want to safely cross areas with higher altitudes in the future, we may need to reduce some of the payload."
"Yeah." Jiang Miao stroked his stubble and asked a question with a smile: "Director Hou, do you think our company's airship can be used for canal connection?"
"Canal connection?" Hou Xin was stunned for a moment, then he thought about it carefully. After a while, he picked up his mobile phone and used the AI on the phone to investigate some of the current situations of inland transport ships.
After browsing the data collected by AI on various inland transport ships, he looked up and replied:
"Boss, if we take the Blue Whale 3's 2000-ton near-ground payload and the payload at an altitude of 1500 meters as 1680 tons, it can pull up an inland transport ship with a deadweight of 1000 tons. Because the deadweight of an inland transport ship with a deadweight of 1000 tons, plus its own weight and fuel, the maximum is about 1600 tons, and the general load is about 1400 to 1500 tons."
Wan Gaofeng, who was standing by, was also analyzing this idea. He expressed his own views: "Among the canals currently under construction in China, the watersheds of the Gan-Yue Canal, the Gan-Zhe Canal, and the Hunan-Guangxi Canal are all at an altitude of about 1000 meters. If airships and gondolas can be used for connection, it is indeed worth considering. In terms of cost..."
Hou Xin gave Wan Gaofeng some additional data: "As for the cost, I just checked. The ship lock fee for the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River is more than 1000 yuan for a transport ship with a deadweight of tons. For a container ship, the price is a little lower, usually yuan."
"Is that so?" Wan Gaofeng knew the carrying cost of the Blue Whale airship:
"Our energy cost is about 0.01 yuan per ton per kilometer. If we want to bypass the Three Gorges Dam, the energy cost is 50 yuan per ton for a 0.5-kilometer trip. Based on 1500 tons, the energy cost is 750 yuan. Add depreciation and other expenses, and the cost is about 1000 yuan. It is indeed worth considering."
Hou Xin nodded slightly: "That's right, especially the waterways on both sides of Nanling and Wuyi Mountain. Due to the limitations of the terrain, even if a canal is built, there will be a limit to the passage of the canal in the future."
Although Wan Gaofeng is not a practitioner in the inland waterway transport industry, he can tell from a little analysis that the navigation speed and efficiency of canals with densely packed locks are very low.
He continued, "Due to the large amount of hydrogen in our large airships, it is estimated that they will not be able to get close to the city. They can only be used as supplementary transportation in sparsely populated areas. The canal connection business envisioned by the boss is indeed promising."
"Well, if we can plan a safe low-altitude waterway near the canal, we can consider using a gondola to connect," Wan Gaofeng added.
"Of course, if we can design a container cage that can be lifted quickly and used on container ships, we may be able to lift the container directly without lifting the ship together, and the cost can be reduced by about one third."
Yang Yuanzhen, who had been silent all this time, suddenly spoke up: "In fact, finding the shortest low-altitude channel near the lock is the most cost-effective solution."
Hou Xin shook his head. "Yes! I'm just worried that the dam management will not agree to the airship getting too close. After all, if thousands of tons of objects fall down during the lifting process, the damage to the dam will be too serious."
Wan Gaofeng also knows that the transshipment distance is key: "If the transshipment near the lock accumulates within 20 kilometers, then our cost is very close to the lock."
After listening to everyone's discussion, Jiang Miao immediately made a decision: "Then the airship company will form a research team with the logistics division to follow up on the airship docking project on the canal."
"Okay." Wan Gaofeng naturally had no objection.
(End of this chapter)