Dr. "after" the wave stood at the head of the tide| Geely Car Yao re-emerged: marching on the way to breaking the border

Text | Reporter Cai Yangyang

As a senior technical expert of Geely Automobile, in the past 12 years, Yao Zaiqi has participated in the development of almost all new Geely models, overcome many technical problems monopolized by foreign countries, and experienced countless exciting moments. But for him, August 2, 2010 has always been the most memorable day.

On this day, Geely officially acquired Volvo, which attracted global attention, and this young talent who returned from his studies in Germany and had the enthusiasm to serve the country officially joined Geely Automobile.

"Contribute to China's national automobile industry", this sentence given to him by the interviewer, has become a spiritual force that supports him to constantly challenge technical problems in the future. Over the years, he has continued to tackle key common technologies such as breaking through foreign technology monopolies and solving the "card neck" project, and has become a leader in the automotive lightweight industry.

1

Innovative thinking

Solve the "comprehensive problem" of car weight loss

Car lightweighting is to reduce the weight of the car. Reducing the weight of the car on the basis of not reducing the performance of the car is an important path for energy saving and emission reduction, and it can also enhance the consumer's sense of experience. Therefore, lightweight technology is a basic common technology for both traditional cars and new energy vehicles.

Yao Zaiqi, who graduated from the materials science major, started from the lightweight of automotive metal materials in Geely.

In fact, automobile lightweight is a "comprehensive problem", not only new material technology, involving new processes, new structures and other fields, at the same time, to take into account the comprehensive performance, cost and other issues to coordinate balance.

Take the recently listed Extreme Kr 001, in the early stage, Yao Zaiqi and the team encountered problems - when optimizing the structure according to traditional design experience, the aluminum alloy structure threshold is heavier than that of steel, and the performance of the car does not meet the requirements, and it is difficult to improve the performance while achieving weight reduction.

Break boundaries and think creatively. In the end, the team transformed the contradiction into a disciplinary optimization problem, and the vehicle adopted a comprehensive technology of weight reduction, which allowed the vehicle to lose more than 40 kilograms and improve performance. Therefore, The Extreme Kr 001 also won the 2021 Automotive Lightweight Design Award.

"Lightweighting involves multiple disciplines, and in my daily work, I have to encounter contradictions at any time, and I have to deal with the balance of attributes at any time." He said, "Many problems seem to be contradictory and insoluble, and if you look at them by breaking the boundaries, the problems will be solved." ”

In fact, around the lightweight technology of the whole vehicle, Yao Zaiqi himself is also continuing to expand the boundaries of knowledge. His business areas have gradually expanded from new materials and new processes to structural development, virtual simulation, multidisciplinary optimization, etc., realizing the transformation from materials engineers to senior technical experts in vehicles.

It is reported that he led more than 10 models of Geely's lightweight design of vehicles, with an average weight reduction of 8%.

"The needs of the enterprise are the direction of my professional development." Yao Zaiqi said that research and development should not only focus on application, but also be forward-looking. At present, combined with industrial needs and national project support, he is participating in the ministry of industry and information technology basic software project "Industrial Internet APP Integrated Development Platform Software". The use of artificial intelligence, big data and other technologies to promote the digital research and development of automobiles, to meet the personalized needs of consumers for automobiles.

2

Immerse yourself in research

A number of technical breakthroughs have broken foreign monopolies

Yao Zaiqi is a Sino-German joint training doctor. At that time, most returnees like him would choose to go to universities to engage in scientific research, while Yao Zaiqi chose to go to enterprises, an unusual path.

At that time, Geely Research Institute had just moved to Linjiang, Hangzhou, and the research and development conditions were still very poor, and the entire research and development system was only more than 1,000 people.

"At that time, I had already received an offer from a university, but after understanding the development prospects of the domestic automotive industry and the situation of Geely, I was still firm in my choice." Yao Zaiqi said that compared with universities, enterprise research and development can make technology at the forefront of demand and truly solve practical problems.

In 2013, Yao Zaiqi entered the postdoctoral research workstation of Geely Holding Group's national enterprises.

As a technical backbone, Yao Zaiqi completed the national science and technology support plan, broke through the energy-saving box heating furnace, high-hardenability materials and other technologies, and cooperated to establish the first domestic independent property rights hot stamping line, realizing low-cost supply.

Previously, the design technology of parts molds was monopolized by foreign countries, and domestic enterprises had no bargaining power. "A production line, which used to cost more than 70 million, now only needs about 10 million." Yao Zaiqi said that another effect of low cost is to drive a large number of domestic parts and components, boosting the development of the industry.

Key technologies of steel and aluminum hybrid connection, lightweight optimization technology of body, SFE fully parameterized modular body database, independent technology of hot stamping ultra-high strength steel, application and development of body structure glue... Combined with the national scientific research projects and the research and development needs of enterprise models, he has presided over or participated in major engineering and technical research and development for many times, and has built an industry-leading multi-disciplinary optimization research and development system for the whole process, forming the direction of integrated and digital research and development of automobile "material-process-structure-performance".

In his research and development work, he found that the domestic automotive industry relies heavily on foreign technology in terms of materials, processes and even industrial software. To this end, as the project leader, he cooperated with Professor Guo Xu of Dalian University of Technology to tackle the national key research and development plan project and develop topology optimization software that can replace foreign commercial software.

Today, as an adjunct professor, postdoctoral supervisor and master's supervisor, he has begun a career of leading students and cultivating talents while developing research and development. "Life is very wonderful, I didn't go to college to be a teacher at first, but I realized this dream in Geely." He smiled and said.

Character business card

Yao Zaiqi, a senior technical expert of Geely Automobile, is engaged in the research and development of new automotive materials, lightweighting, parameterization, structural optimization and virtual performance. He has completed the national "Twelfth Five-Year Plan" science and technology support, national 863 and other projects, published more than 40 papers, and declared more than 30 patents. Completed the vehicle lightweight R & D system, led more than 10 models of lightweight design, the average weight reduction of models reached 8%. Through the cooperation of "industry,000," we have cultivated more than 10 innovative enterprises and trained nearly 100 engineers. Selected as "151 Talent Project" in Zhejiang.