[News from News Center] On Jan. 8th, 2017 National Science & Technology Awarding Ceremony was held in Beijing. YSU Prof. Fucheng Zhang’s project The Key Technology and Application of Ultra-fine Bainitic Steel Manufacture won the Second Prize of 2017 National Award for Technological Invention, which has been the second state-level prize since he won the Second Prize of National Award for Technological Progress in 2002.
Prof. Fucheng Zhang at the ceremony
The credential
Prof. Fucheng Zhang and his team have been engaged in bainitic steel research for over ten years. Aiming at the technical problems such as low phase transformation rate and unstable performance of bainitic steels, they invented key generic technology for the manufacture of ultra-fine bainitic steel with rapid phase transformation. The invented low-carbon ultra-fine bainitic steel owns the comprehensive mechanical properties of martensitic aging steel, but the cost is only 1/10 of the latter. The service life (overload capacity) of rail frogs manufactured using this technology has reached 350 million tons. The fatigue life of newly invented high-carbon ultra-fine bainitic bearing steel with carburized surface, martensitic bearing steel with low temperature in heart and the overall high-carbon ultrafine bainitic bearing steel has been doubled comparing with the traditional martensitic bearing steel. The high-end heavy-duty bearing manufactured using this technology has been widely applied. In addition, three brand new bearing steels have been included in national standard GB/T3203-2016 Carburized Bearing Steel and metallurgy industry standard YB/T 4572-2016 Ring Rolling Mills and Workblank of Bearing Steel respectively. The heat treatment technology has been included in national standard GB/T XXXX Heat Treatment Technical Conditions of High-carbon Chromium Bearing Steel in Rolling Bearings and industry standard JB/T8881- XXXX Carburizing Heat Treatment Technical Condition for Antifriction Bearing. The bearing industry spoke highly of ultra-fine bainitic steel and thought it led the technological progress of the whole industry. The ultra-fine bainitic steel is thus called “The Second Generation of Bainitic Bearings” and the China Bearing Industry Association will focus on the promotion of this technology during the 13thFive-Year Plan. The invented ultra-fine bainitic wear-resistant steel plate made by ultra-strong medium-carbon dilute alloy has been widely applied in port facilities, mining machinery and other engineering fields, of which the wear resistance and welding manufacturability have reached the level of imported Hardox600 wear-resistant steel plate, but costing only 1/3 of the latter. The steel plate invented has been the self-owned manufacturing technology of high-end ultra-strong wear-resistant steel plate and has been exported to countries and regions involved in the Belt and Road Initiative and Europe. The overall technology of this achievement has reached the international advanced level. It has won one First Prize of Technical Invention Award from Ministry of Education, 2 First Prizes of Technical Invention Award of Hebei Province and one European production certification. And it has formulated 2 national standards, one metallurgy industry standard, one machinery industry standard, one enterprise standard, one European product certification and one national training young person. Through this project, a researcher has been funded by the National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars.
The applications of ultra-fine bainitic steel
(Photos above from School of Materials Science and Engineering)
After the evaluation of discipline group, the jury committee and the award committee, a total of 271 projects and 9 scientists were honored the National Award for Science and Technology. Among them, there are 35 National Award for Natural Science including 2 First Prizes and 33 Second Prizes; 66 National Award for Technical Invention including 4 First Prizes and 62 Second Prizes; and 170 National Award for Science & Technology Progress including 3Grand Prizes, 21 First Prizes (including innovation teams), and 146 second prize. Besides, seven foreign scientists won the International Science & Technology Cooperation Award of the People's Republic of China.
(Translated by Zhengjie Li)
