Major Heavy Industry: Starting with a Fake Marriage

The train arrived in Beijing at 3 PM. Chen Siyuan came to pick me up, this time in a black sedan, its surface gleaming, reflecting your image. He wore a dark blue overcoat and a gray scarf, and looked much more energetic than before.

"Brother Jiang, Old Zhou asked me to pick you up. Let's go straight to the research institute for a short meeting first."

"What do you mean?"

"Preparatory meeting. Deputy Director Zhang is here, and Chief Engineer Zhao is here too. Old Zhou said to get together first, so tomorrow's report can't go wrong. He asked me to tell you not to be nervous, just treat it as a chat with an acquaintance."

Jiang Cheng nodded.

The car drove into the institute's courtyard. The locust trees had all their leaves fallen, and icicles hung from the branches, sparkling like crystals in the sunlight. The snow on the ground had been swept into piles in the corners, covered with a layer of dust.

He went upstairs and pushed open the door to the conference room.

There were four people sitting in the room—Old Zhou, Deputy Director Zhang, Chief Engineer Zhao, and Chief Engineer Chen. Documents were spread out on the table, and each person had a cup of tea in front of them, the water still steaming, white wisps rising one by one.

"Xiao Jiang, you're here." Old Zhou stood up, walked over, and shook his hand. The old man's hand was thin, with prominent knuckles, but it was very strong. "Sit down."

Jiang Cheng sat down. Old Zhou returned to his seat, screwed the cap on his pen, then unscrewed it, then screwed it on again. He did this several times.

"At tomorrow's meeting, a section chief from the Commission of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense, surnamed Li, and a deputy director from the Ministry of Aviation Industry, surnamed Sun, will be coming. The Institute of Materials Science and Engineering and the Institute of Automation will also send representatives. You will speak for forty minutes; don't go over time. Going over time will backfire." He paused. "After you finish speaking, they will ask questions. Answer whatever they ask. If you can't answer, just say you don't know; don't make things up. Anything you make up will be exposed as soon as they see through it."

Jiang Cheng nodded.

Chief Engineer Chen pulled a piece of paper from her folder and handed it to him. The paper was ordinary white, densely covered with writing, the characters neat and precise, each stroke seemingly carved. "These are the questions they might ask. I've listed over a dozen; take a look. The most likely question is—the feasibility of technology transfer. Can your coating technology be applied to other engine models? What are the costs of such application? How long will the process take? These are all things you need to think about beforehand." She paused. "Another question they might ask is—what will happen to this technology after you leave? Who will take over? You can't stay in Beijing forever."

Jiang Cheng took the paper, folded it, and put it in his pocket. The edges of the paper were a bit stiff, digging into his fingers.

Chief Engineer Zhao spoke, his voice carrying a crisp and decisive quality.

"Comrade Jiang Cheng, I have another question. Does your coating technology have any special requirements for the substrate material? Will every batch of blades achieve the same effect? ​​How do you control quality during the production process? These are the things the military cares about most. They don't care how advanced your technology is; they care about—is it reliable? Is it usable? What if it breaks down?" He took off his glasses and wiped them. "The military doesn't talk to you about theory; they only talk about real combat. You tell them the data, and they ask if it's been used in live ammunition. Has your coating been used in live ammunition?"

Jiang Cheng picked up his pen and quickly jotted down these questions in his notebook. He wrote with great force, the pen tip making a scratching sound on the paper.

It was already dark when the meeting adjourned. Jiang Cheng walked out of the conference room and stood in the corridor. The moon outside the window was bright, shining on the snow, making it appear silvery-white and dazzling. He lit a cigarette, took a drag, and slowly exhaled. The smoke dispersed in the moonlight, grayish-white, and quickly dissipated.

"Xiao Jiang." Old Zhou came out of the conference room and stood next to him. The old man's shadow was cast on the ground; it was long and thin.

"Old Zhou."

Are you nervous?

"A little."

"Don't be nervous." Old Zhou put his hands in his pockets, looking at the moon outside the window. "You've been in Beijing for three months and accomplished what others couldn't do in three years. The people who should be nervous are those sitting in the audience listening to you, not the ones speaking on stage." His voice was soft, but every word landed firmly on the ground.

Jiang Cheng remained silent.

Old Zhou patted him on the shoulder. "Go back and get some sleep. I'll sit next to you at tomorrow's meeting. If you forget your lines halfway through, just look at me, and I'll give you a hint."

The following day, a summary meeting was held in the institute's main conference room.

The conference room was twice the size of the last one, seating fifty or sixty people. The audience was packed, a sea of ​​black seats. In the first row sat Old Zhou, Deputy Director Zhang, Chief Engineer Zhao, and Chief Engineer Chen. Beside them were two unfamiliar faces: one in a military uniform with gold stars on his shoulders, gleaming under the lights; the other in a dark blue Zhongshan suit, his hair meticulously combed and styled with hair wax, gleaming with oil.

Jiang Cheng sat on the stage, a microphone and a water glass in front of him. The microphone was black with a heavy iron base; he touched it but couldn't budge it. A white tablecloth covered the table, so bright it was almost blinding, as if it had just been unpacked. He placed the report materials on the table, opened to the first page, and glanced at it. The paper was covered in dense writing; he looked at it for a few seconds, then closed it.

He wanted to read from a prepared script. It wasn't a last-minute decision on stage; he had thought about it for a long time the night before—if he read from a script, the audience would lose focus. They had seen too many reports read from a script, and the audience would close their eyes as they listened.

He wants them to listen.

"Distinguished leaders, comrades, my name is Jiang Cheng."

The audience fell silent. No one coughed, no one flipped through papers, and no one whispered.

"I'll just talk about one thing today—how we increased the lifespan of turbine blades from 800 hours to 1,200 hours."

He opened his notebook, where a drawing was on it. It wasn't a graph, but a hand-drawn cross-section of a blade, with each key dimension marked. He pointed to the air pores on the drawing with his finger.

"This is a turbine blade. Look here, the film cooling vent. Air blows out from here, forming a film on the blade surface to separate the high-temperature combustion gases. The vent diameter is designed to be 0.5 millimeters, and the positional accuracy is ±0.1 millimeters. A difference of 0.01 millimeters makes a difference in cooling effect."

He began to speak. Not in the dry technical details, but more like telling a story.

He explained how he discovered the nozzle wear. That day, Xiao Ma disassembled the nozzle head, touched the inner wall of the nozzle with his finger, and said, "Master Jiang, look here." He stuck his finger in, and a layer of black powder adhered to his fingertip. The powder wasn't ash; it was metal worn off. Jiang Cheng took the nozzle and looked at it against the light. There was a fine wear mark on the inner wall, like a ring of fine sandpaper.

He explained how to adjust the parameters. The powder feeding rate was adjusted from 6.5 to 6.8, the spraying distance from 105 to 110, and the substrate preheating temperature remained unchanged. He made three sets of test pieces. The first set was too thin, the second set showed a decrease in bonding strength, and the third set passed both tests.