The Fiery Era: Becoming an Industrial Giant

Chapter 134 Zhou Zhiqiang's Destiny [Please Subscribe]

"Hey, it's you. What's up?"

"Who? Why are you asking him? What kind of crooked idea are you having now? Let me tell you, Comrade Zhou Zhiqiang is also highly valued here. Don't keep thinking about trying to recruit him to your Ministry of Machine Building."

"If you can't talk to Mr. Zhou, then I'll go talk to Mr. Zhou myself. Comrade Zhou Zhiqiang recently became a mechanical engineer."
He was even praised by a high-ranking leader, who told him to do a good job in the heavy machinery industry.

"I've helped you guys. And about this matter, okay, okay, I understand. Well, you should show some appreciation, and stop asking me for more people. Alright, you're just stingy, Old Wang."

After hanging up the phone, Leader Sheng smiled helplessly.

Then, Director Cai, who was in the office, asked, "Sir, is this related to Comrade Zhou Zhiqiang?"

"Yes, it seems like it was a few days ago when our engineer Zhou discovered that their street office's steelmaking methods were incorrect."

Worried that other places might end up like the blast furnaces run by the local government, producing only scrap steel, he went home and developed a set of techniques best suited for traditional rural steelmaking, which he then sent to the Ministry of Metallurgical Industry.

Leader Sheng said with a smile, "As a result, their Ministry of Metallurgy sent people to investigate all the communes around Beijing. Of the seventy-six blast furnaces, sixty-nine were substandard."

"Luckily, we discovered it. If we hadn't, none of the products produced would have met the standards. Who could use steel that would break so easily?"

"When Comrade Zhou Zhiqiang came back, I gave them a day off. At that time, he was still at home working out a set of rudimentary steelmaking techniques!"

Director Cai clicked his tongue in surprise and said, "Comrade Zhou Zhiqiang really can't rest. I feel like he's busy all the time."

When he was at Shanghai Heavy Industry Plant No. 1, he was the one who worked the most and stayed the longest in the main research team. Few would disagree that he made the greatest contribution.

"The big leader is right. Young people are like the sun at seven or eight in the morning; they should always be full of vigor and vitality."

Leader Sheng doesn't see Zhou Zhiqiang often. He spends most of his time inspecting industrial layouts outside, and recently he's been busy with industrial construction in the west, so he rarely returns to the ministry.

I haven't met Zhou Zhiqiang many times; the last time I saw him was at Dafa Factory.

However, now that I hear that Zhou Zhiqiang is both capable and hardworking, I can't help but feel a sense of goodwill towards this kind of young man.

Suddenly, Leader Sheng asked, "What has Comrade Zhou Zhiqiang been up to lately?"

Upon hearing this, Director Cai said, "Besides organizing electroslag welding process training at the ministry, I've been going back to Dafeng Agricultural Machinery Equipment Factory."

By the way, their factory, or rather their technical department, seems to be planning to develop something new again. A few days ago, Comrade Fuhua from Dafeng Agricultural Machinery Equipment Factory contacted me to request all the technical data about harvesters.

"It's possible that Comrade Zhou Zhiqiang needed to research something, which is why Comrade Fuhua requested materials from the ministry."

Director Cai paused for a moment before continuing, "However, our ministry doesn't have much technical information on harvesters, so I'm afraid we can't offer much help."

The information they had on agricultural machinery was all provided by the Russians.

Harvesters do exist, but only a small number. YTO has just started producing tractors that imitate the Russians.

Harvesters are just starting out, and there isn't much technical data available.

"Comrade Zhou Zhiqiang is indeed a talented person. We support him in whatever he wants to study and let him think about it as he pleases."

Leader Sheng said with a smile, "Maybe one day we'll get a surprise."

Director Cai smiled and said, "That's right."

Leader Sheng originally wanted to talk about something else, but suddenly remembered something and continued to ask, "By the way, what's Zhou Zhiqiang's current situation? Is he still the head of the technical department at Dafeng Agricultural Machinery Equipment Factory?"

"Deputy Leader Wu plans to transfer him to the Second Machine Tool Plant."

Director Cai immediately said, "The Second Machine Tool Plant has undergone several reforms, but the results have been minimal. Deputy Leader Wu wants to appoint Zhou Zhiqiang as the deputy director, responsible for technology and factory production."

Upon hearing this, Leader Sheng frowned slightly and said, "Technology and production, aren't those the factory director's responsibilities? Why make him the deputy factory director?"

Director Cai guessed, "It might be because Comrade Zhou Zhiqiang is too young. He is only twenty-four years old."

More than half of 1958 has passed, and the end of the year is fast approaching. Zhou Zhiqiang has officially turned twenty-four, or twenty-five by the traditional Chinese age reckoning.

He's not young, but compared to many factory directors these days, Zhou Zhiqiang is actually quite young.

"Should we find a mature and steady comrade who doesn't care about the factory director's power to assist Zhou Zhiqiang, and then let him freely reform the Second Machine Tool Plant?"
Comrade Jianhong's arrangement is reasonable; let's do as he says.

Leader Sheng quickly guessed Vice Leader Wu's idea, and this arrangement was indeed the most reasonable.

Otherwise, a factory director in his twenties would definitely encounter some difficulties when he takes over. At that time, a comrade who can protect him should be transferred to be the factory director.

With Zhou Zhiqiang at the forefront of reform, and another comrade providing support from the side, Zhou Zhiqiang was able to lead the charge.
After figuring it out, Leader Sheng stopped interfering with Zhou Zhiqiang's affairs. With Wu Jianhong's arrangements, Zhou Zhiqiang would definitely be able to give full play to his talents in the most suitable position.

------

Zhou Zhiqiang has been back in Beijing for about ten days now, and he spent four days in a row at the ministry during this time.

In order to compile and train more technicians to understand the electroslag welding process, Zhou Zhiqiang stayed in the department for four days.

We had already spoken with the factory in advance; it was a temporary transfer from the higher-level unit to Dafeng Agricultural Machinery Equipment Factory, so there were no problems at all.

After Chen Li and the factory staff helped Zhou Zhiqiang get the materials, Zhou Zhiqiang began to study them.

Unfortunately, there was too little information, so Zhou Zhiqiang had to collect it from other sources. He had to look at anything that was even remotely related to combine harvesters.

Moreover, he would explain things to other technicians in the technical department. Zhou Zhiqiang was generally generous in teaching others what he knew, unless he was too busy to do so.

The technical department isn't too busy right now. After overseeing production matters each day, they spend the rest of their time working with Zhou Zhiqiang to research combine harvesters, though they mostly assist him.

To be honest, Chen Li could barely keep up with Zhou Zhiqiang's understanding and approach to technology, perhaps by half a step. One day.

Zhou Zhiqiang had just finished lunch and was planning to go back to the technical department to rest for a while before continuing work in the afternoon.

However, on my way back to the technical department, I passed by the factory gate and suddenly noticed that there seemed to be a lot of people gathered there.

Curious, Zhou Zhiqiang went over to take a look.

After listening for a while, Zhou Zhiqiang only got a general idea of ​​what had happened.

It seems that the group of people outside the factory were coming to deliver something to the factory, but the security department had not received any notification, so they could not be allowed to enter.

The group of people outside were getting anxious. They were there to deliver something, so why weren't they allowed in?
However, the security department needed to ask the leadership, but unfortunately, Deputy Factory Director Liu was on leave today, and the factory director and secretary were in a meeting.

The factory now only has the newly arrived deputy factory director, Li.

But Deputy Factory Director Li is in charge of logistics, and he doesn't know or understand things like production materials. Since the factory didn't issue a notice, it probably didn't.

Therefore, Deputy Factory Director Li dared not let anyone in casually, but he also dared not let the security department turn people away, so he said he needed to make a phone call to ask for instructions and then hung up the phone.

After hearing the gist of the conversation, Zhou Zhiqiang walked past the crowd to the security personnel and asked the people outside the factory, "Comrades, where are you from?"

He was the highest-ranking person on site; since Deputy Factory Director Li didn't show up, he was the highest-ranking person in the factory.

And since I'm also a file clerk, I need to be responsible.

“We are from Sandaokou Commune. This is steel that we have worked hard to produce. It is delivered to you, our comrades in production. Why don’t you want it?”

The middle-aged man who came to deliver the items also spoke somewhat anxiously.

"Comrade, don't rush, let me take a look first."

Zhou Zhiqiang calmed the man down and then instructed the security department to open the gate.

The security guards at the entrance wanted to say something, but Zhou Zhiqiang said he would take responsibility if anything happened, or they could send the head of the security department instead.

Upon hearing this, the security guard at the gate opened the gate for Zhou Zhiqiang; there were four leaders in the factory with a higher rank than Zhou Zhiqiang, but three of them were not present, and one refused to show up.

The security department is also under the dual leadership of the armed forces department and the factory, and sometimes it has to respect the opinions of the factory leaders.

Moreover, the head of the security section was one rank lower than Zhou Zhiqiang.

After the gate opened, Zhou Zhiqiang didn't rush to let the people from Sandaokou Commune in. Instead, he distributed cigarettes to each of them to calm them down before continuing to ask...

"Comrade, why is Sandaokou Commune sending things to our factory? I don't remember our factory having any assigned tasks with Sandaokou Commune. What did your district leaders say?"

"The district leaders don't care about us and just tell us to figure it out ourselves. The factory can't store it all, so they told us to take it back first, but we don't have a warehouse there."
Later, remembering how your factory brings honor to the country, which is commendable, I decided to send it to your factory.

The middle-aged man leading the group was the deputy head of the Sandaokou Commune. The decision to deliver steel to them was made by the entire commune.

The main problem is that there's nowhere to put it when we take it back. It already takes up a lot of space at a fellow villager's house.

After Zhou Zhiqiang found out the details, he went to the oxcart and donkey cart at the back and carefully examined the steel under the straw mat.

Although he didn't test it, he could tell at a glance that it was scrap steel.

The steel used in their factory is all roughly processed semi-finished products, which can be directly processed into parts after being delivered; as for this steel, it's probably unusable.

"Comrade Niu, I remember a few days ago... Never mind, it's alright."

Zhou Zhiqiang had originally intended to say that the Ministry of Metallurgy had temporarily suspended the primitive steelmaking process a few days ago due to a lack of scientific guidance. However, considering the amount of scrap steel, he estimated that it hadn't been produced in a day, but rather over a month.

It must have been refined before the Ministry of Metallurgical issued the notice.

After figuring things out, Zhou Zhiqiang pondered for a while and came up with an idea.

Then Zhou Zhiqiang turned to the security guard and said, "Go and call Wang Guoping, the head of the materials department, and tell him I'll be waiting for him at the main gate."

After instructing the security guards, Zhou Zhiqiang turned back to Niu, the deputy head of the Sandaokou Commune, and said, "Comrade Niu, don't worry. When the head of our factory's materials department arrives, he will be able to arrange for the steel you delivered."

"Don't rush back when you arrive. Have a meal at our factory before you go; you've come all this way, you must be tired. Eat your fill before you go back."

Vice President Niu happily replied, "Oh, oh, that's fine with you. It's good that it's helping you. You don't need to eat here; we'll eat when we get back. We don't want to trouble our workers."

"Hey, Comrade Niu, now that workers and peasants are one family, you can't say anything that might cause trouble."

Zhou Zhiqiang stopped them and advised, "You may not be tired, but the other members must be. Why don't you stay for lunch? It's lunchtime now."

After his persuasion, the man finally gave up the idea of ​​leaving his things and rushing back.

Shortly after, Section Chief Wang from the Materials Department arrived and was stunned by the scene before him.

However, Zhou Zhiqiang quickly explained it to Section Chief Wang.

But Wang Guoping said with some difficulty, "Section Chief Zhou, this is not easy. I can't put these things into the warehouse without an order, and we don't need them at all."

"Just find a place to put it, no need to put it in the warehouse, just make sure it can be unloaded and let them go back lightly."

Zhou Zhiqiang assured him, "I'll talk to the factory manager when he gets back."

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(End of this chapter)