Prospect of forging industry
What is forging
Forging is a processing method that uses forging machinery to exert pressure on metal blank to produce plastic deformation to obtain forgings with certain mechanical properties, certain shape and size. It is one of the two components of forging (forging and stamping). Forging can eliminate the defects such as as as cast porosity in the smelting process and optimize the microstructure. At the same time, because the complete metal streamline is preserved, the mechanical properties of forgings are generally better than those of castings of the same material. For important parts with high load and severe working conditions in relevant machinery, forgings are mostly used, except for rolled plates, profiles or weldments with simple shape.
Forged forgings have the characteristics of high bearing capacity, long service life and strong adaptability to harsh working conditions. They can be widely used in oil and gas exploitation, wind power generation, metallurgical machinery, engineering machinery, ships, pressure vessels, nuclear power and other industries.
According to different forging methods, forging technology can be divided into free forging, die forging, ring rolling and special forging. After hundreds of years of history, modern forging industry has formed systematic and advanced forging technology and forging technology.
Characteristics of forging industry
Product customization
Forging products are customized and generally non-standard products.
In the actual production and operation process, the forging industry is usually operated according to the mode of “determining production by sales”. The downstream customers of the forging industry are mainly various equipment manufacturing enterprises, and the sales mode of the forging industry is generally direct sales.
The pricing mode of cost plus is generally adopted in the sales of products. The product price is determined according to the raw material cost, forging processing cost and a certain profit level. The raw material cost is determined by the raw material price at that time, and the raw material price is subject to floating pricing according to the supply-demand relationship of the raw material market, material types and specifications, The forging cost is mainly determined by the process flow of the enterprise, including forging, heat treatment, rough machining, finishing, testing and other related factors.
High industry barriers
The customization of forging products determines that the forging industry, especially in the field of large and high-end forgings, has high industry barriers.
1) Qualification certification and customer barriers
For different downstream application fields, the production and sales of forgings have different qualification access requirements. For example, the supply of marine products needs to obtain the certification of the corresponding classification society, the supply of main oil and gas equipment products needs to pass the API certification, and all major equipment manufacturers have a strict supplier certification system.
2) Equipment and capital barriers
Forging industry has the characteristics of large investment and long construction cycle. It is a typical capital intensive industry. Rolling ring forgings and large free forgings have high requirements for equipment, high value of large forging equipment and high requirements for capital.
In addition, due to the characteristics of the industry, raw materials account for a large proportion in the cost composition of the main business, and the procurement of raw materials and the turnover of production and operation need to occupy a large amount of working capital.
3) Technical and experience barriers
Forging products have the characteristics of multi specification, multi variety and customization. Advanced production equipment, fine quality management and long-term accumulation of production experience are important guarantees for the long-term development of forging manufacturers. To ensure consistency, stability, reliability and advanced nature of products, enterprises need a large number of professionals and skilled technicians, and the training of these professional and technical personnel and their mastery of technology need long time accumulation.
Development trend of downstream market
The forging industry carries out thermal deformation processing on metal materials to turn them into parts and components supporting relevant equipment, and their products are not final industrial consumer goods.
The downstream industry’s requirements for equipment and various technical indicators such as forging product accuracy, performance, service life and reliability dominate the technical trend of the forging industry. At the same time, the prosperity of the downstream industry also directly determines the demand and market capacity of the forging industry.
Prospect of forging industry
Although China’s forging industry has made some achievements, there are still many problems compared with foreign developed countries. The ninth five year plan is about to pass. During the Tenth Five Year Plan period, with the development of the national economy and machinery industry, the forging industry must adapt to it. Here are some views on the development of China’s forging industry in the next five years.
The forging industry should have the concept of elimination
At present, there are many obstacles restricting the development of China’s forging industry, but less or no elimination is one of the important factors hindering the development of the industry. Some enterprises only have a few non matching forging hammers. They can only open a few hammers or completely outdated things every month. They hope to produce good products. As a result, they find that a small amount of investment has become a bubble, and the consequences can be imagined. The forging industry should have this understanding. When the enterprise is particularly difficult, it should have the courage to give up and regenerate or invest a lot of money to completely transform and regenerate; Some particularly aged equipment and technologies should be eliminated, and there should be no idea of maintenance. With the reform and opening up, the advanced theories of western developed countries have been accepted in the forging industry. In the next few years, some enterprises will be closed or merged to regenerate, which is an irresistible trend.
Go abroad and explore new markets
Some people of insight in the industry believe that going abroad to seek the market is the only way for China’s forging enterprises, otherwise China’s forging market will become a big market for foreign forging production enterprises. In the next few years, the conditions and direction for China’s forging industry to move towards the world are: China’s entry into WTO is conducive to the export of primary products – Forgings, and forgings can be produced with materials at the same level as international material prices; Forging enterprises should enhance their strength, which must be solved before Chinese forging enterprises participate in international competition, that is, technology needs innovation, price and cost reduction, and production efficiency; The training of foreign trade (export) talents in forging enterprises will become more and more important; Some forging enterprises with good conditions or excellent production lines and expertise are expected to become the pioneers in entering the international market.
In recent years, although China’s forging industry has developed, the progress of technological transformation is not fast, so it is urgent to study how to carry out technological transformation for enterprises. The key contents are: how to locate the product and how to locate and analyze the market; How and how to understand the technology market environment of Chinese enterprises; How to check forging cost; What is the world’s popular technology; Re recognition of domestic repeated J construction.
Forging enterprises will be upgraded
Over the past 20 years, China’s forging industry has developed rapidly, but in the past time, from the overall level, enterprises are almost at the same level. After recent development, some enterprises have come to the fore, and the following situations will appear in the future: enterprises that can mass produce the same type (kind) of forgings will become enterprises with stable benefits, including some joint ventures and wholly-owned enterprises; Enterprises that use proprietary technology to produce forgings will become risk-based enterprises with large profits; The production of products is complicated, and forging enterprises without leading products will be good and bad, which is very difficult; A number of enterprises integrating forging and machining will become parts manufacturing enterprises, and they may purchase forgings; Other enterprises that do not meet the needs of development will be gradually eliminated and reorganized.
According to the above situation, there will be a number of enterprises with professional production lines in the forging industry, which will be new investment enterprises. According to the development experience of forging industry in various countries and the situation of forging Market in China, it is expected that about 100 forging enterprises in China will affect the development trend of the industry in the next few years, and 350 ~ 400 enterprises will finally establish themselves in China’s forging industry market.
Talent competition is more prominent
More and more forging enterprises feel that there are serious problems with talents, and begin to realize the importance of talents, but the lack of forging talents in the industry will be a big problem that can not be ignored. Therefore, talent training and how to train will become a matter of concern in the industry. In the next few years, forging professionals who understand both modern technology and management, and have modern consciousness and high-tech product use skills will be the focus of enterprises.
Hot spot of forging industry in China
Product hot spots
After the hot spots of investment in connecting rod, forged flange, crankshaft, front beam and steering knuckle, enterprises have turned to precision forging, cold forging and warm forging gears and automobile and other gearbox and engine parts for investment. This hot spot will continue for several years, but new hot products will also appear, which are extruded rod and barrel forgings. Nonferrous metal forgings for automobiles, building decoration and electrical products will not heat up soon, but someone will certainly invest. In addition, the domestic market of nonferrous forgings also needs to be cultivated. Another kind of profitable hot products are construction machinery, especially highway and bridge machinery parts.
Technical hot spots
Hot precision forging, cold warm forging and expanding process will attract great attention of enterprises in recent years. In addition, special processes such as cross wedge rolling can not be ignored. Here, we should remind relevant enterprises not to fail due to overheating like investing in production lines such as front beam and crankshaft.
Walk out of the misunderstanding of investment in process technology
Many enterprises think that it is worthwhile to spend money on a lot of equipment, but it is not worthwhile to buy a set of technical documents or a set of molds or a computer CD and floppy disk. This is a misunderstanding in the forging industry. Technology import is far more important than equipment import, and the introduction of technology development methods is the most important thing. The introduction of talent training is also a kind of technology import. How many forging enterprises in China are willing to pay overseas experts to give technical guidance and lectures? hardly any. With the development of the industry, technology introduction will appear in two forms. One is to purchase technology directly, the other is to invite overseas experts to the factory for technical guidance. The former is to buy technology; The latter is the method of technology development. 8、 Forecast of forging Market
This is a difficult problem to describe clearly. This paper mainly discusses several possible product markets from the aspect of enterprise market development, which can be used as a reference for enterprises in market development and technical development: car complex steering knuckle and high-precision broken connecting rod; Synchronizer ring gear; Precision forming of pulley; Precision forming of main and auxiliary shafts and complete sets of teeth of motorcycle engine; Car tire bolts; High quality and stable synchronizer gear ring and engine aluminum forgings; There are 56 kinds of cold extruded automobile shaft forgings, 52 kinds of light trucks and 23 kinds of front drive cars; Spline shaft cold forming; Cold and warm forging gear; Fork teeth of excavator; Copper forgings such as air conditioner; Building decoration parts, high-quality vehicle tools and aluminum fire extinguisher bottles for vehicles; Construction machinery forgings, construction and road construction machinery forgings, scaffold fasteners, etc.
Many people think forging is an outdated process. Imagine a blacksmith hammering hot iron with an anvil in a dark shed. Some people may regard the drawings of the forge as an example of the dawn of the industrial revolution. History books often depict rough and strong men feeding hot gold ingots into the stomach of a panting steam hammer. In the manufacturing environment of the 21st century, these scenes no longer exist, although the forging process, heating and pressure forming metals have remained basically the same for centuries. Today, forging is not out of date. It is an essential process to produce the parts of the machines we rely on every day.
Industrial forged parts are produced to become key components in various equipment. In these equipment, conditions require durability and elasticity, and failure will lead to disastrous consequences. Based on the application of thermal deformation energy to metallurgical technology and material characterization, a necessary forging technology has been developed in the past thousands of years.
The past century was an era when many new materials, processes and production methods were invented. Each product is constantly developing to meet the needs of specific production areas, improve economy and efficiency, provide new design capabilities, and provide materials that can improve the performance of specific end uses. Many processes will support the ability to provide performance “close to forging performance”. This means “not as good as forging”. Forging is a method to produce “forging performance”. Generally, the “forging properties” are compared with the “standard textbook” values established 100 years ago. Just like the progress of new materials and processes, forging has also made progress and improved metallurgical properties to meet the challenge of improving strength, toughness and durability while reducing weight. Combined with time tested and modern forging methods, parts with the best performance can be produced.
Source: China Flanges Manufacturer: www.epowermetals.com
(Yaang Pipe Industry is a leading manufacturer and supplier of nickel alloy and stainless steel products, including Super Duplex Stainless Steel Flanges, Stainless Steel Flanges, Stainless Steel Pipe Fittings, Stainless Steel Pipe. Yaang products are widely used in Shipbuilding, Nuclear power, Marine engineering, Petroleum, Chemical, Mining, Sewage treatment, Natural gas and Pressure vessels and other industries.)
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