From all-round academic master to chief scientist - Chapter 155 Super-level titanium aluminum alloy

July.

The northern hemisphere, facing direct sunlight, has entered the hottest period of the year.

However, when the sun’s radiation energy reaches the earth, it will also suffer various weakenings. By the time people feel it, it is actually less than one percent of its total radiation energy.

For the few people who are currently working in the National Key Laboratory of the Institute of Aeronautical Materials, the temperature brought by this one percent energy is far less than the temperature in the vacuum electric arc furnace they are close to now.

The temperature inside has reached nearly 2000K.

As for what is cast inside, it is naturally the titanium alloy designed by Lin Xiao.

From the theoretical model to the actual entity, they spent more than a month designing three sets of production processes.

The people responsible for designing these process plans are either academicians or Yangtze River scholars, such as Academician Chen Bao of the Academy of Aeronautical Materials, and Academician Wen Changping of the Institute of Metal Research… In short, they are all big names in the domestic materials industry.

Of course, there are not many people, only four, but no matter what, this lineup is quite luxurious.

These four big guys are all people who can lead national key projects alone. They came to this project together to be responsible for the design plan. This is probably the kind of situation that can only occur in large-scale national science projects.

Lin Xiao was surprised to learn that his project had attracted so many big names. Even Cao Zhong, who invited these people, found it incredible.

When he sent invitations to these three academicians, Yang Jiang, he originally thought it would be great if one of them could come, but all three of them agreed, so their small research group now has several big names.

Of course, these three big guys are willing to come over, not only because of the importance of this topic, but also because of Lin Xiao’s reputation. No matter what, it’s good to get to know each other, and the time required to design a production process for a material There are still relatively few, at least compared to the projects they take, which often last a year and a half.

However, although there are many big names, it is still difficult to design this production process.

Because it requires the use of single crystal directional solidification technology and it is a new titanium-aluminum alloy, it is still a bit tricky for these academicians. Two of their three previous plans have failed. If the third one is now If the plan is not successful, then they will have to continue to design other processes, which will cost more money and time.

Therefore, they can only hope to succeed this time.

“Okay, Xiao Huang, take it out of the oven and get ready for directional solidification.”

Chen Bao greeted, and then Huang Haoran and several other graduate students came up and started operating.

These graduate students were also called here to do odd jobs. After all, some things cannot be done by the older academicians themselves, and it is impossible for Lin Xiao, the person in charge, to do it, so Chen Bao took the opportunity to do it for himself. The graduate students were called over, and of course, they all signed confidentiality agreements.

Upon hearing the instructor’s greeting, these graduate students quickly went up, turned on the furnace, and then started operating according to the steps of directional solidification.

Directional solidification pays attention to a temperature gradient to avoid the turbulent flow of internal liquid during the solidification process of molten metal, which ultimately affects the performance after solidification.

In addition, there are other details, which are the key to ensuring their success.

In this way, as time passed slowly, they finally took out several titanium alloy rods from the solidification furnace.

The shimmering metallic luster on the surface made everyone present look forward to their performance later.

“Okay, let’s do the performance test.”

After Chen Bao finished speaking, they left the casting laboratory and returned to the testing laboratory next door.

Place one of the titanium alloy rods in the stretching machine and lock it in place, and then continue to apply force.

“100MPa, 200MPa…”

Until finally, they tested the maximum tensile strength.

949MPa!

When this number came out, everyone present was shocked.

“Holy crap! What’s going on? Why is it so much higher than the theoretical value?!”

“Isn’t the theoretical value just over seven hundred?”

These academicians felt incredible, and if the tensile strength was more than 700, this would be in line with their initial thoughts.

At present, the highest tensile strength among titanium alloys is 1764MPa, but that titanium alloy is not a titanium-aluminum alloy, but is matched with other precious metals. The density of precious metals is generally relatively high and is not suitable for use in aerospace.

Titanium-aluminum alloy is regarded as one of the best materials for aerospace, because the proportion of aluminum alloy in it is relatively high, which greatly reduces its density, thereby greatly reducing its weight. Generally speaking, titanium The tensile strength of aluminum alloy is basically between 400-700.

As a result, the tensile strength of their new titanium-aluminum alloy has actually reached more than 900 MPa. Isn’t this going against the grain?

When they saw that the tensile strength reached over 700, the first thought of these academicians was that it was stable. They finally succeeded. But now a second thought appeared in their minds. Is this because the test data is wrong?

But obviously, it is impossible to make mistakes, so in this case… is there an unexpected surprise?

It’s like fighting monsters until the end, only to find that the BOSS has escaped, and it’s still a double-yolked egg? !

Immediately, they looked at Lin Xiao next to them, wanting to know what the designer was thinking.

However, what surprised them all was that Lin Xiao just watched this scene quietly, with no expression of surprise on his face.

In fact, he still had some regrets in his heart. According to the data provided by the system, the intensity could actually rise by about 100MPa, directly reaching over 1000MPa.

After all, this is something he spent so much time to create. If he couldn’t break a few records, it would be too much.

However, it may be due to process problems or errors in the production process that the price is so low.

However, the problem is not big. The gap in craftsmanship can be slowly modified in the future. Now to this extent, it can be regarded as meeting expectations. At least, he proved that his calculations were correct.

It also has to be correct.

He came back to his senses, glanced at those who were looking over, and said with a smile: “Let’s discuss these things later. No matter how you say it, this is a surprise. Let’s do other tests now.”

After hearing Lin Xiao’s words, several academicians also put aside their surprise. As Lin Xiao said, this is also a surprise.

At the same time, they also admired Lin Xiao’s calm state of mind.

As the person who designed this material, ordinary people would probably be too excited. Even academicians like them would be the same. God knows how much help such a powerful titanium alloy material can bring to their future military technology. .

The turbine blades, compressor blades, etc. of fighter engines can all directly use this new material. By then, their engine thrust-to-weight ratio may directly become the strongest among fighter jets.

All in all, this brand-new material will bring countless possibilities.

Thinking of these futures, they can’t wait to see other properties of this titanium alloy.

Then, other tests continue to start.

Now they only test the properties at room temperature, and the performance at high temperature is the most critical.

However, after seeing the performance of this material at room temperature and the results at high temperature, it goes without saying.

Sure enough, as the results of the high-temperature test came out, this new titanium alloy once again showed shocking capabilities.

Whether it is high-temperature structural strength, creep resistance, etc., they all demonstrate the capabilities of top-notch materials.

It’s a pity that they don’t have professional equipment here, otherwise they would want to simulate the performance of this material in the high temperature and complex stress environment that turbine fan blades are in.

But no matter what, judging from its current performance, it is capable of functioning as a turbine fan blade with no problem at all! And it’s not just ‘no problem’, there are too many good things about it.

This, known as the crown jewel of the materials industry, was born in their hands!

And it’s the brightest one.

Although I don’t know how good the materials used in fighter jet turbine blades are in the United States, they are now confident that they are definitely not as good as their materials.

Even considering the recyclable first-stage rocket that China is developing, there may be no problem using this titanium-aluminum alloy.

At this moment, these academicians felt lucky in their hearts. Fortunately, Cao Zhong did not refuse when he invited them to come, and they were able to participate in such an undertaking.

Then, they looked at Lin Xiao again.

The young man just smiled, but did not show too much joy.

This once again made them feel sincerely admired. Lin Xiao didn’t show much joy just now, probably because he wanted to see all the other test results come out, but now that all the major test results have come out, he still looked so calm. This is probably the state of not being happy with things, not being sad with oneself, and forgetting favors and disgrace together, right?

It’s no wonder that after making so many achievements, he can continue to achieve breakthroughs, leaping from mathematics to today’s materials science.

Chen Bao’s graduate students who were present didn’t know what to say at this time.

Before, they called Boss Chen Bao because Chen Bao paid them money for his project. But now, just a few months later, they have gone to Lin Xiao’s project again. Lin Xiao pays them wages, and they want to call Boss Lin Xiao again. .

This change caught them all off guard.

In addition, they previously felt that computational materials science was only an auxiliary and not orthodox compared to experiments. But now, it is simply nonsense!

Look at Lin Xiao. He started studying computational materials science in March, and it’s only been more than four months since July. Then he backhandedly designed a material that can be used as a turbine fan blade, and look at its properties——

This is simply cheating, even worse than cheating!

All they want to say now is, I want to learn computational materials!

“We succeeded.”

Chen Bao said with emotion.

“Yes, it was successful.” Academician Wen Changping also nodded.

I don’t know who gave the first round of applause, then the second round of applause, the third round of applause, until finally, the laboratory was filled with applause, and everyone looked at Lin Xiao and expressed congratulations to him.

Lin Xiao also clapped and expressed his gratitude for their congratulations.