Source: China Youth Daily client
China Youth Daily, China Youth Network reporter Wang Lin
At the Beijing Winter Olympics, the snowmobile program known as "Ice F1" is a sport that slides on the ice tracks on a steerable sleigh, and since its birth in Switzerland at the end of the 19th century, it has attracted attention for its extremely fast speed and high ornamentality.
Ivo Ferriani, president of the International Snowmobile Federation, said in an interview with the media that in the future, China will become one of the global leaders in snowmobiling. During the Winter Olympics, not only Chinese snowmobilists galloped on the field, but also domestic snowmobiles were also speeding up the development and optimization. The goal of becoming a global leader in snowmobiling is also getting closer.
Just as the "sharkskin" swimsuit can help swimmers break world records, top-notch sports equipment can also help athletes build confidence and push the limits. For a racing event like a snowmobile that wins or loses only milliseconds, whether the equipment is advanced and reliable is more important for athletes.
In the past, China's snowmobile sports have long lacked the blessing of domestic snowmobiles, and even at the beginning of the establishment of the snowmobile national team in 2016, there was no snowmobile of its own in China, and the national team training and competition used imported cars, but also deposited abroad, and a complete set of scientific and technological systems such as snowmobile design, materials, manufacturing, processes, products and so on was a blank in China. In contrast, most of the snow fleets in developed countries in Europe and the United States have well-known institutions or enterprises to provide targeted research and development and technical support, and will not easily sell the most advanced snowmobile products and technical systems.
In the snowmobile race, the athlete will be tightly wrapped in the cabin with a speed of more than 100 km/h, and only the hands and head can move freely, which requires the safety of the premise to reduce the air resistance as much as possible, but also to meet the physical characteristics of the athlete, and based on the condition of the track, the hardness and temperature of the ice surface to match the right ice knife, to achieve lower friction resistance and better control.
However, these problems involve the cross-integration of multiple disciplines and elements such as aerodynamics, materials science, structural mechanics, and kinematics, and require the cooperation and wisdom of technical personnel from different professional backgrounds such as design, materials, processing, and assembly.
In order to break the monopoly of foreign brands on snowmobiles, achieve a breakthrough in the "zero" of domestic snowmobiles, and help Chinese Winter Olympic athletes achieve better results, in 2019, the Ministry of Science and Technology's "Science and Technology Winter Olympics" key special project supported the "Winter Project Carbon Fiber Composite High-performance Equipment Key Technology" project, and Its Domestic Snowmobile is the key research object of the project.
In October 2019, led by the 703 Institute of the First Academy of China Aerospace Science and Technology Group, beijing University of Chemical Technology, China Aerospace Aerodynamic Technology Research Institute, Beijing Sport University, Dongguan Institute of Technology and many other technical advantages in related fields declared the project and received support, and set up a special research group for domestic snowmobiles with 703 institutes as the core within the project, responsible for the design, development and application demonstration of the first domestic double snowmobile prototype.
When I first received the task, the members of the research team were very excited and nervous. "The Winter Olympics are coming soon, I can contribute to the Winter Olympics, directly serve the national team, I feel very excited, and at the same time I am afraid that I will not be able to do well, I feel the pressure is great, because I have never seen a snowmobile, I have little attention on TV, and my heart is very bottomless." Zhou Yu, a senior engineer at the 703 Institute of the First Academy of China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, recalled.
At the beginning of the project, there was no professional snowmobile track in China, there was no snowmobile, and the technical information was extremely limited, which was the biggest difficulty faced by domestic snowmobiles. However, thanks to the "gods of all roads" of the research team: there are academicians of carbon fiber composite materials, technical experts who have long been engaged in the research and development and application of aerospace equipment products, aerodynamic and wind tunnel test technology specially designed by space vehicles, and former snowmobile national team coaches.
In the continuous collection of data, collation and repeated technical discussions, the goal of the technical research and development of the snowmobile is gradually clear - low wind resistance, high reliability and good control. Under the guidance of the standard specifications for snowmobile equipment formulated by the International Bobsleigh Federation, the technical solutions of a generation of snowmobiles have basically taken shape.
With the continuous efforts of the project team, a decommissioned snowmobile was introduced from abroad. In the study of the introduction of snowmobiles, the team found that the existing technical solutions need to be improved, at the same time, many ideas have been verified, the team's confidence is greatly encouraged, and the development process of domestic snowmobiles is accelerated.
In July 2020, under the guidance and promotion of the Winter Games Center of the General Administration of Sports, a domestic snowmobile implementation promotion team was established, and a weekly work report mechanism was adopted, and the development of domestic snowmobiles was put on the "fast lane". In January 2021, the team completed the research of the first two-person snowmobile principle prototype in China, achieving a breakthrough in domestic snowmobile equipment from scratch.
The development of the domestic snowmobile principle prototype is not smooth, because of the lack of experience in the development and manufacture of snowmobiles, the early design stage is not comprehensive, resulting in the first generation of domestic snowmobiles in the later assembly because of insufficient accuracy assembly is very difficult. There are also some parts that are not standard parts and cannot be purchased on the market, and the R& D team needs to be handcrafted a little bit.
In March 2021, when the first generation of domestic snow vehicle prototypes were subject to the stage review of the technical experts of the national snow fleet, there were problems such as the steering structure was not advanced enough and the ergonomics needed to be optimized. Under the promotion and support of the General Administration of Sport and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, FAW Group, which has great advantages in these aspects, joined the research team and set up a joint research and development team to simultaneously carry out the development of domestic double snowmobiles and four-person snowmobiles. Among them, the 703 Research Institute and team of the First Academy of China Aerospace Science and Technology Group are responsible for the design and research and development of snowmobile composite products, and FAW Group is responsible for the design and research and development of metal components such as chassis frames and ice knives.
In the development process of domestic snowmobiles, this group of young people from different professional fields also broke through a lot of "card neck" technology, successfully integrated the product development technology and experience in the aerospace field into sports products, and declared a number of national invention patents.
The domestic snowmobile they developed uses composite materials on the body and metal materials on the frame, and integrates and applies 3 advanced aerospace core technologies. For example, the domestic T800-class carbon fiber composite material technology, which was originally only used in rockets and Boeing 787 aircraft, the density of the material is only 1/5 of steel, the strength is 2 times that of steel, and the use of the snowmobile can greatly reduce the weight of the snowmobile under the precursor to ensure the safety of the equipment, reduce the center of gravity of the snowmobile, improve the stability of the equipment taxi, and the body weight of the double snowmobile is only less than 50kg.
According to Zhou Yu, the domestic snowmobile also adopts a high-precision overall manufacturing technology with complex structures, which ensures that the complex shape of the snowmobile can also achieve high-quality preparation. The entire snowmobile body is divided into three major components: the front body, the rear body and the front cover, and the connection structure is greatly reduced, and the shape accuracy is very high.
Finally, the domestic snowmobile also adopts aerodynamic shape design technology, using fluid dynamic calculations and wind tunnel tests, and after many iterations, designs a streamlined shape of rudder body fusion. Theoretical calculations and wind tunnel test results show that the air resistance coefficient of domestic snowmobiles is more than 5% smaller than that of imported similar snowmobiles, and it is estimated that the competition results can be improved by 0.3s to 0.5s.
With the joint efforts of all parties, in September 2021, the domestic snowmobile was delivered to the Winter Sports Management Center of the State General Administration of Sport, and it was officially unveiled before the Winter Olympics, ending the long-term monopoly of snowmobile equipment by foreign brands. The domestic snow car not only realizes from scratch, but also has low wind resistance, high reliability and good control, and has been recognized by the national snow team, and is now promoting relevant international certification.
Seeing the athletes of the Chinese snow team galloping on the Winter Olympic field in front of his home, Zhou Yu felt proud and stressed. Although the domestic snowmobile has not yet been applied to the Winter Olympic Games, he firmly believes that the development of domestic snowmobiles can help the Chinese snow team achieve better results, and can also drive other high-end ice and snow equipment to be localized as soon as possible, promote the development of the entire ice and snow equipment industry, and promote the participation of the whole people in ice and snow sports.