Is it reliable to engage in aero-engine scientific research in the national system?

OFweek Industrial Control Network News: it is reported that China will set up a national aero-engine group company to integrate the aero-engine business scattered in related companies into the group. The Chinese government and a number of state-owned enterprises, including the China Aviation Industry Corporation, will also invest a total of about 35 billion yuan in the newly established company. In addition, the related assets involve more than 40 units, including almost all aero-engine-related research and development units in China, with total assets of 110 billion yuan.

The news has not been officially confirmed, but few people who have seen it will doubt its authenticity. Under the general environment of China's growing comprehensive national strength and rising international status, it is perfectly normal to develop an "aviation Chinese heart". Especially after China's large passenger plane C919, which has completely independent intellectual property rights, has been put off the line, solving the "heart disease" of the aviation industry has become the next necessary move.

The difficulty is obvious. Friends who have studied engineering know that aircraft engine is a pearl on the tip of the pyramid of modern industry and a real "industrial flower". In order to have this pearl, under the current situation of our country's weak industrial foundation, it will take at least 10, 20 or more years of painstaking efforts. At present, there are only three British and American companies that can fully master civil aero-engine technology: Luo Luo, GE and Hewlett-Packard.

More difficult than technology is the difficulty of the system. According to the Bloomberg news, the country will also choose the old routine of "concentrating its efforts to do great things" in the conquest of aero-engines, pooling the power of all aero-engines in the country to build aircraft engines with independent intellectual property rights.

Seeing here, the author seems to smell an unreliable smell. Just as the national system can produce a large-scale Olympic Games that have never been seen before, and it can also make the number of Olympic gold medals in the top three, but it is difficult to improve the sports level of the whole people, it is not very hopeful to use administrative power to integrate the existing R & D strength and to make advanced civil aviation engines with the efforts of the whole country.

Perhaps some people immediately retorted, you see, high-speed rail, is not also the product of the national system of scientific research, has now swept the country to the world ah? More insiders said that our country has also developed its own Taihang engine, which has equipped the J-11 and J-10 with power. The author can only answer that high-speed rail and Taihang engines are similar to competitive sports and are closed products, and the product attributes of "military products or quasi-military products" cannot be compared with those of large aircraft engines as civilian products.

In order to make an advanced civil engine, market acceptance must be taken into account. This involves the consistency of batch products, cost and cost performance, after-sales service and other issues. The best solution to these problems is market competition. Through moderate market competition, enterprises are urged to produce products with innovative technology and low prices, and spontaneously speed up the progress of research and development and improve the level of after-sales service.

From this point of view, the R & D and manufacturing of Chinese brand cars is more similar to the development of civil aero-engines. In the early stage of China's automobile development, with the efforts of the whole country, we made our own red flag sedan. However, after so many years, it is still difficult to say that the red flag car has several ups and downs. On the contrary, it is after the opening of the market. Chery, Jilin, Great Wall, BYD and other Chinese brand car companies come from behind and have a sky of their own. The root cause is the grasp of market demand and the result of competitive choice. Speaking of which, I have to say a few more words. At a time when we are ambitious to take down large aircraft engines, China's independently developed car engines are still difficult to compete with the world's advanced level, and most of our best-selling vehicles are equipped with a "foreign heart." at present, Chinese enterprises have not completely won the automatic transmission technology that matches the engine. If the national system or administrative orders were useful, these problems would have been solved a long time ago.