Chinese enterprise provides world-class bearing products to China's space industry

On April 29, the Long March No. 5 carrier rocket loaded the China Space Station "Tianhe Core Module" into the air at the Wenchang Space Launch Site in Hainan and successfully completed the launch mission. Since then, China's space station "on-orbit formation" mission officially kicked off and manned the space station. The aerospace industry has reached new a new stage. Completing the mission of the orbital components of the space station is an important symbol of building a stronger aerospace country. And one Chinese bearing manufacturer provided the bearings and parts needed for the building of the space station.

Renewable environment control and life support technology can provide astronauts with the necessary life resources for long-term orbital work and life. This is the key bottleneck technology for the space station's long-term operation in orbit. The information that my country can access in the research process of renewable environmental control and life support technology for space stations is very limited, and the research and development is very difficult. After seven years of unremitting efforts, Chinese Research Institute has made breakthroughs in the development and testing of corrosion-resistant bearings, providing technical guarantee for the long-term survival of astronauts in orbit.

All rotating components in the "Tianhe Core Cabin" environmental control life support system work in solution, which poses a huge challenge to the corrosion resistance and wear life of bearing materials. Due to compatibility reasons, common bearing materials cannot meet the requirements of the subsystem. The initial plan can only meet the ground test for more than ten hours, which is far from the long-term on-orbit service life requirement. For this reason, the Research Institute established a project research and development team. After 7 years of unremitting efforts, the research and development team has successively replaced several bearing material solutions and more than ten structural solutions to gradually increase the bearing test life, and finally the ground test reached the overall required life goal of the space station. It provides a strong guarantee for the long-term and reliable operation of the renewable environmental control and life support system.

Chinese enterprises have successively made contributions to the "Tiangong" laboratory, the "Shenzhou" series manned spacecraft, the "Chang'e" moon exploration project. In the future, they will accelerate the transformation and upgrading of the industry, continue to make efforts in the field of special bearings, and help the development of China's aerospace industry to a new level.