In 2024, the Northern Heavy Industries (NHI) Endeavour TBM (Tunnel Bone Mine) set a world record for single-machine tunneling of 26.521 kilometers. This achievement was driven by breakthroughs in multiple core technologies. Previously, TBM main bearings had long relied on imports. NHI, in collaboration with research institutions, conducted hundreds of tests and developed high-strength, wear-resistant main bearings. These bearings offer a 20% longer service life and a 35% lower cost than imported products, effectively breaking the monopoly of foreign technology. The Endeavour TBM’s intelligent geological detection system plays a crucial role in complex geological construction. It analyzes rock hardness, water content, and other data in real time, automatically adjusting the cutterhead speed and thrust. For example, in a mountain tunnel project, when encountering crushed rock, the system quickly switched to “staged cutting” mode, achieving a stable daily tunneling efficiency of over 12 meters, a 40% increase over traditional equipment. Furthermore, the equipment’s modular design reduces cutterhead replacement time from three days to eight hours, significantly reducing project downtime. This provides an efficient solution for long-distance tunnel construction in China and further consolidates my country’s technological leadership in the global shield machine industry.

A XCMG XGC88000 (4,000-ton class) crawler crane demonstrated impressive performance at a large petrochemical project in southern China, precisely lifting a 2,000-ton quenching water tower to a 38-meter-high installation base in just three hours, completing a highly challenging aerial operation. The crane’s core advantage lies in its “super-lift counterweight + variable-luffing boom” design. The super-lift counterweight system features a foldable structure that can be disassembled and loaded onto a truck for transportation, reducing on-site assembly time by 50% compared to similar equipment, completing the project in just two days. The variable-luffing boom automatically adjusts its angle and length based on the load and height. During this lift, the boom was adjusted from 60 to 82 meters. Twelve sets of intelligent sensors monitored the load in real time, ensuring that equipment sway was controlled within 5 centimeters during the lift, maximizing lifting safety and accuracy. Furthermore, its equipped “hoisting path planning system” simulates the entire process in advance, avoiding on-site obstacles and minimizing collision risks. This successful hoisting operation not only ensures the petrochemical project’s on-schedule commissioning, but also demonstrates that my country’s ultra-large tonnage hoisting equipment has reached internationally leading levels, breaking the long-standing monopoly of foreign brands in this field.

MCC Heavy Industry’s 400 MN hydraulic die-forging press, the world’s largest single-cylinder winding precision forging press, is the forger of key components for the China-made C919 large aircraft, providing core support for the production of the C919’s landing gear and large fuselage structures. While traditional multi-cylinder hydraulic presses are limited in forging precision and fuselage rigidity, this hydraulic press utilizes a “single-cylinder + prestressed steel wire winding” structure, increasing fuselage rigidity by 30%. With forging precision controlled to 0.1 mm, it can process large forgings with a maximum diameter of 3.5 meters and a weight of 50 tons. The C919 landing gear forging production process begins with heating the aviation-grade high-strength alloy billet to 1200°C. The hydraulic press then repeatedly forges at a pressure of 400 MN (equivalent to the weight of a 40,000-ton weight), refining the metal’s internal grain size and significantly improving its strength and toughness. After forging, the “intelligent controlled cooling system” slowly cools the forging at a rate of 5°C/minute to prevent cracks caused by large temperature differences. Previously, large aviation forgings in my country had to be imported from abroad, resulting in high costs and lead times of up to six months. The commissioning of this hydraulic press has shortened production cycles to two months, reducing costs by 40%. This has completely ended my country’s dependence on imports for large aerospace forgings and laid a solid foundation for the mass production of large aircraft in China.

Northern Heavy Industries’ Φ5200×24500mm cylindrical mixer, a material-leveling expert in the sintering process of steel mills, will effectively address many of the pain points of traditional mixers after winning the bid and commissioning in 2023. In steel production, the uniformity of material mixing during the sintering process directly impacts sinter quality. This mixer significantly improves production efficiency and quality through three core design optimizations. First, a multi-stage water spray pipe and pre-filtration system are used, with eight sets of independently adjustable water nozzles positioned along the length of the cylinder. These nozzles, combined with the filtration system, remove impurities from the water and prevent nozzle clogging, improving material moisture uniformity from 60% to 95%, reducing sinter composition fluctuations. Second, the roller assembly has been upgraded to self-aligning roller bearings. Special grease is used within the bearings to automatically compensate for cylinder misalignment, reducing wear by 50% and extending service life from 1.5 years to over three years. Third, an intelligent lubrication system uses sensors to monitor bearing temperature and grease levels in real time, automatically replenishing grease when the grease level is low. This extends the equipment maintenance cycle from 5,000 hours to 10,000 hours, reducing maintenance downtime by four times annually. In use at a large steel plant, this mixer has increased sinter production by 25% and reduced energy consumption by 8 kilograms of standard coal per ton of sinter, resulting in annual cost savings exceeding 10 million yuan. It has become a key piece of equipment for cost reduction and efficiency improvement at the steel plant.

Shandong Chufeng Heavy Industry’s crawler aerial work platforms are a powerful tool for complex applications such as construction and municipal maintenance, particularly excelling on uneven surfaces and muddy environments. Their core competitiveness stems from their “crawler chassis + intelligent leveling” design. The tracks are made of high-strength rubber with a deep tooth pattern, providing a contact patch three times larger than a wheeled chassis. This improves grip on muddy surfaces by 60%, allows for a climbing grade of up to 40%, and enables stable operation even on a 35° slope. The “one-touch leveling” feature utilizes four sets of hydraulic outriggers linked to tilt sensors. When the equipment is parked on sloping ground, the sensors detect the tilt angle in real time, and the outriggers automatically extend and retract within 5 seconds, keeping the platform level within 0.5°, ensuring operator safety. Furthermore, the equipment is equipped with Huawei’s “Aftermarket Application Management Platform,” which monitors the location, operating hours, fault codes, and other data of tens of thousands of devices in use in real time. When equipment malfunctions, back-end engineers can remotely diagnose and guide on-site personnel to perform repairs, reducing troubleshooting time from 24 hours to 4 hours. In 2024, the export value of this equipment exceeded RMB 200 million, and it was widely used in infrastructure projects in Southeast Asia, the Middle East and other regions.

The borehole-expanding shaft tunnel boring machine (TBM) developed by Northern Heavy Industries for a pumped-storage power station in Zhejiang Province is an underground pioneer in shaft construction for power stations, revolutionizing the inefficient and high-risk nature of traditional blasting methods. Traditional shaft construction is extremely challenging due to the confined space and complex geology. However, this TBM’s innovative “conical cutterhead + borehole-expanding and slag removal” design is a key feature. The cutterhead is conical, with a diameter gradually expanding from 3 meters at the top to 6 meters at the bottom. During construction, the top cutterhead first excavates a pilot hole, and then the bottom cutterhead expands the hole, resolving the problem of traditional TBMs’ limited rotation in the shaft. The slag removal system utilizes a combination of a screw conveyor and negative pressure suction to rapidly transport slag to the surface, increasing slag removal efficiency by 50% and preventing slag accumulation from blocking the construction corridor. During the manufacturing process, the equipment applied 3D intelligent modeling technology to simulate the assembly precision of the cutterhead and fuselage in advance, with an error control of 0.1 mm. Laser cutting and robotic welding processes were used to increase the strength of key welds by 20%, ensuring that the equipment would not leak when subjected to high pressure in a vertical shaft 200 meters underground. Since its commissioning, this equipment has increased shaft construction efficiency by three times compared to traditional blasting methods, achieving “zero accident” operations. This provides new equipment support for the rapid construction of pumped-storage power stations in my country and opens up new directions for the cross-scenario application of shield machine technology.