Data map: Li Xuezhong (right), a riveter of CRRC Changke Co., Ltd., is instructing workers to operate **Photo by Xinhua News Agency Wang Haofei.
Zhao Zhonghe is a seventh-level riveter. Our factory was newly built after the founding of New China, and the workers were rated late, and the level of the old workers was low. Unlike the Northeast, which was liberated early, the level of workers is higher than that of our Shandong, and as for the level, it is difficult to say.
Master Zhao is my master, but he really didn't teach me anything. Because he is the deputy director of the workshop, he rarely comes to work in the group. Moreover, he has a big shelf, and mortals ignore him. The masters in our group who entered the factory in 1958 and are already in their thirties, he rarely cares. I just entered the factory, I don't know how to deal with the master, and I haven't learned to bend over and bow my head, and he doesn't pay much attention to me anyway.
Master Zhao likes Zhang Tongchang. I can't remember whether Zhang Tongchang entered the factory in 1956 or 1958, but his technical level is much higher than that of his peers.
One time it was an amplified sample, and I had just entered the factory at that time, and I didn't know anything about magnified samples. I saw that the two of them had put out a very complicated workpiece in a good way. During this period, Master Zhao's attitude towards Zhang Tongchang was like treating his peers. Another time, it was to make a very simple steel trough. It is about 10 mm or 12 mm thick steel plate, 400 mm wide, more than a meter long, and more than half a meter high. To make this thing, it is not difficult to cut and flatten the steel plate, but the difficult thing is electric welding. When welding, the local temperature of the steel plate increases, and it will deform. Originally, the four corners of the steel channel were 90 degrees, and the deformation angle was wrong. Master Zhao and Zhang Tongchang asked the welder to weld a little here and there, and every time he welded, Zhang Tongchang measured it with a square ruler, and then told the welder to weld ** and weld longer. After all the welding, this rectangular steel channel is 90 degrees at each corner, which is really exquisite.
Zhang Tongchang was soon transferred to support the third line, and Master Zhao did not come to work in the group. But he still has to come every year to make steel molds, because others can't do it.
The steel mold is to cut the steel plate with a thickness of thirty or forty millimeters into long strips and twist them into a ring. If you want a 10,000-ton hydraulic press for this thing, it's very easy to do. At that time, we didn't have any machinery and equipment, and we relied on manpower. That's hard.
Master Zhao twisted the steel mold, and he must let Zhao Xinyi burn the fire. Zhao Xinyi is a sixth-level worker and a master of fire. When I was a riveter, I hardly had to rivet anymore, it was all welding. The only riveting was also a fire burned by Zhao Xinyi. There were four or five people who riveted and riveted: one who burned the fire, one who connected the nails, one who riveted the top, one who carried the sledgehammer, and one who put on the hat. The rivet holder holds a conical iron cylinder in one hand, and iron tongs in the other, and knocks the iron cylinder with iron pliers, which is to be nailed. The furnace must be seven or eight meters away from the rivets, and there are some workpieces in between, and the light in the workshop is slightly dim, and the red rivets pass through the gaps of the workpieces that are horizontal in the air, drawing a leisurely red arc, which is falling in the iron cylinder in the hands of the riveters. As soon as the rivet enters the iron cylinder, the nail receiver must slow down, otherwise the rivet will pop out. The timing of the slowdown should be just right, so that the rivet falls into the tin tube as lightly as a feather.
Zhao Xinyi is also very skilled in throwing rivets, that is not thrown by hand, the iron pliers are picked up with the rivets, it is difficult to grasp when to loosen the pliers, but he throws them extremely accurately every time. The most important thing about rivets is fast, catch the rivets with rivets, clamp them with iron pliers and stuff them into the holes drilled in advance, the person who tops the rivets resists hard, and the two people on the opposite side pick up the sledgehammer "bell" a few hammers, smash the rivets into the hole, and then press them with a steamed bun-like mold sleeve, and then "bell" a few hammers, and a round rivet is riveted. Any one of the links is delayed, the rivet becomes cold, and it will be troublesome to knock it out of that small hole again. When this kind of thing happens, the master wants to scold people. I'm not qualified enough to get started, so I can only watch from the sidelines. Such an incomparable cooperation will make people inexplicably moved to watch.
The steel mold also had to be made in a hearth, not in the workshop, but in a four-walled shed to the north of the forging workshop. I suspect that this place is for the steel mold, because I haven't seen anything else done here. The hearth is to dig a rectangular groove in the ground, build several layers of refractory bricks on both sides, put a cast iron stove on the stove, and the blower pipe stretches under the stove, burns coke on it, and then puts the cut steel plate on it after the coke is burned evenly. These jobs are all under the management of Zhao Xinyi. What color the coke is burned into, how long it takes, and what color the steel plate is burned to be burned evenly and thoroughly depends on experience.
When Zhao Xinyi was busy lighting the fire, we smoked and drank tea next to us. Master Zhao's salary is high, but he also smokes cigarettes. His fingers were the same as those of his own, thin and elongated, except for the thick joints. The cigarette he rolls is very even, moderately tight, and looks unhurried when he smokes it. He didn't pay much attention to us, and occasionally said a few words, mostly related to work. He stayed there, and we young people didn't dare to speak. He exudes a cold and stern aura all over his body, which makes people become cautious unconsciously.
The fire shouted "Okay", and Master Zhao threw away the cigarette butt, stood up unhurriedly, and carried the iron tongs over. One of the helpers, also carrying iron tongs, dragged the red-hot steel plate weighing hundreds of pounds over with him, and stood on a cast iron platform a little lower than the coffee table. The steel plate with a thickness of thirty or forty millimeters is also a little stable when standing on the platform, but the steel plate is grooved (that is, the two ends of the steel plate are first beaten into a specified arc), so that there is only one line where the steel plate and the platform are in contact, and it is completely dependent on Master Zhao and another person to clamp and straighten it with iron pliers, so high and heavy steel plate, crooked a little more, will fall to the ground with a bang.
The steel plate stood still, and a few of us young people quickly picked up the sledgehammer and hit it. After eight years as a riveter, this sledgehammer is the most difficult to hit. One is unpleasant. The height of the steel plate is about the same height as ours, and it is awkward to hit the steel plate with a sledgehammer and raise the arm as high as the side of your head. The second is that the force of this sledgehammer must be vertical, if the force is oblique, it is equivalent to pushing the steel plate, and the steel plate will still fall down, if you really want to do this, you don't need Master Zhao to scold you, you feel embarrassed.
I had a hammer that didn't hit, and not only did it knock the plate down, but the sledgehammer bounced back and hit my calf bone. Maybe I was injured, and Master Zhao didn't say anything. I went to the factory hospital, and the doctor touched it, saying that the bones were fine, the epidermis was bruised, and wrapped me with gauze, so I went back to pick up the sledgehammer.
It has to be burned several times before the steel plate can be twisted into a rough ring, and a solid cylindrical steel mold is put into it and hammered more carefully. Master Zhao shouted "Stop", and we stopped. He erected the steel mold and used an iron caliper to stretch it in to measure, and the caliper rubbed against the inner wall of the steel mold, making a stabbing sound, indicating that the size was just right, and no matter from which angle it was stretched in, it could be seen that the steel mold was round. What is shot with a sledgehammer is accurate to this extent, it is a matter of technology, experience, and perhaps an intuition nurtured by long-term practice. For each steel mold, Master Zhao only needs to shout once to stop, and there is no time when the measurement is inappropriate, and the furnace is red and then beaten.
Although more than one middle-aged master was dissatisfied with Master Zhao's big shelf, he also admitted that his level was indeed high. Later, I read more people and found that many people who really have great skills are so dust-free. Most people don't like this kind of person, or maybe this kind of person doesn't want to like him at all.
In 1975, the old workers retired, and their children could. Master Zhao retired, and his son entered our factory, and he was in our riveting group. He himself went to work as a temporary worker in our factory's family factory. The so-called family factories are almost all housewives, about one or two hundred people, producing some civilian products such as gauze and whetstones, and I don't know what Master Zhao can do when he goes. (Xu Xiaocun).