Chinese shipbuilding industry

I can't quote everyone and we are going off topic so mods can move this into relevant thread please

but there is a lack of understanding here between commercial and warship building

China has been building wings and fuselage for Airbus for decades commercial airline, yet ARJ 21 and C919 are proving to be decades long programmes in the making when they do home made, and even home means the landing gears are still outsourced as is over 1000s of other parts

UK has retained what is core to its industry, it cant make steel but it has just bought out Sheffield Forgemasters after £2.6 million take over from MoD, why ? because they can make military grade steel

UK cant make commercial ships yet it can build the Worlds most advanced nuclear submarines, Astute Class + Vanguard Class and now the Dreadnaught class

UK never built a carrier in 3 decades, the industry was dead they said and out comes 2 x 65,000+ ton Carriers with the largest 5th generation naval air wing in the World

Warships for Navy is not related to Commercial shipbuilding two totally different games, yes off course there is overlap as both are same industry but just because one can build containers and tankers doesnt mean they can build warships, btw Egypt has been building commercial ships and they bought the 2 x Mistral Class from France which were set for the Russians who themselves couldn't build LHD

and whoever said Japan and South Korea can build aircraft carriers, yes they can but will they work? we are taking about aircraft carriers here not a re-fitted tanker, both Japan and South Korea are needing the help of the UK for their carrier programmes

lets take for example just the deck coating requirement for the F35B heat exhaust at 1500C, a company called Monitor Coatings came to find the solution, a Thermal Metal Spray System consists of a metallic compound of aluminium and titanium , Specialist robots were developed to apply the coating. Powdered metal was fired through a jet of plasma at temperatures of around 10,000C. The molten droplets then flatten and solidify, creating a tough coating

the programme took 2 years of testing, and endless remaking of the metallic compound

and yes I know what the reply will, oh yes China can do it , South Korea can do it and so can Japan but they wish not too

well I can tell you these things come from a gene pool of knowledge decades in the making which these counties simply dont have

Rosyth in Scotland did it and Govan is doing the Type 26 programme the list goes on

btw Turkey also has a very good shipbuilding programme, they bought Spanish design for their LHD

Easy to claim things without knowing the details of how a warship is actually built

Tam said:

Their large nuclear submarines are completing hulls that the Soviet Union has already started.

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Just a small nitpick, but this was only true for the early builds. New builds are from scratch.

asif iqbal said:

I can't quote everyone and we are going off topic so mods can move this into relevant thread please

but there is a lack of understanding here between commercial and warship building

China has been building wings and fuselage for Airbus for decades commercial airline, yet ARJ 21 and C919 are proving to be decades long programmes in the making when they do home made, and even home means the landing gears are still outsourced as is over 1000s of other parts

UK has retained what is core to its industry, it cant make steel but it has just bought out Sheffield Forgemasters after £2.6 million take over from MoD, why ? because they can make military grade steel

UK cant make commercial ships yet it can build the Worlds most advanced nuclear submarines, Astute Class + Vanguard Class and now the Dreadnaught class

UK never built a carrier in 3 decades, the industry was dead they said and out comes 2 x 65,000+ ton Carriers with the largest 5th generation naval air wing in the World

Warships for Navy is not related to Commercial shipbuilding two totally different games, yes off course there is overlap as both are same industry but just because one can build containers and tankers doesnt mean they can build warships, btw Egypt has been building commercial ships and they bought the 2 x Mistral Class from France which were set for the Russians who themselves couldn't build LHD

and whoever said Japan and South Korea can build aircraft carriers, yes they can but will they work? we are taking about aircraft carriers here not a re-fitted tanker, both Japan and South Korea are needing the help of the UK for their carrier programmes

lets take for example just the deck coating requirement for the F35B heat exhaust at 1500C, a company called Monitor Coatings came to find the solution, a Thermal Metal Spray System consists of a metallic compound of aluminium and titanium , Specialist robots were developed to apply the coating. Powdered metal was fired through a jet of plasma at temperatures of around 10,000C. The molten droplets then flatten and solidify, creating a tough coating

the programme took 2 years of testing, and endless remaking of the metallic compound

and yes I know what the reply will, oh yes China can do it , South Korea can do it and so can Japan but they wish not too

well I can tell you these things come from a gene pool of knowledge decades in the making which these counties simply dont have

Rosyth in Scotland did it and Govan is doing the Type 26 programme the list goes on

btw Turkey also has a very good shipbuilding programme, they bought Spanish design for their LHD

Easy to claim things without knowing the details of how a warship is actually built

Click to expand...

China doing components for commercial aircraft help advance her own industry so quickly that she went from making J-8s to J-20s within a short generation.

Sure you can build nuclear submarines but how deep can it go? Its not whether or not you can build a submarine but the true test of its steel is how deep you can go regardless whether you are conventional or nuclear. For that matter, who has the deepest diving submersibles.

The Yuan is said to have a tested depth of 550 meters. The Soryu is said to have tested a depth of 600 meters. The deepest record is held by the Soviet Oscar class which reached 800 meters. The Soviets are known to use titanium on their submarines.



The UK actually has a more viable ship building industry than the US, as European countries tend to have more socialist governments to the shipping industry. They might not be building container ships but they are still building cruise ships and ferries. Babcock, which is going to make the Type 31 frigate, is best known for building ferries.

Egypt does not build high end commercial ships. The bigger the ship is, the greater the stresses it puts onto its frame and this is where structural integrity is tested and that's where the technology comes into play. Seawise Giant, which measures over 450 meters in length, has full weight of over 650,000 tons. How many aircraft carriers is that? Same applies to Egypt same also applies to Turkey. If they build commercial ships, both are in the small potatoes category. By the way, Seawise Giant was made in Japan. In terms of compensated gross tonnage, China has 48% of the world market and South Korea has 28%. Japan has around 10%. The whole of Europe, including the UK, has about 10%. (From Statista).


If Egypt is to build military ships, it would be the small ones. In fact, this year, they successfully made a corvette. Turkey is making warships but its small, and they are looking to up theirs to the destroyer category.

Your ability to build one big ship is going to relate to how you build other big ships. Some kinds of commercial ships are intensely complicated as they are designed for the management and storage of dangerous chemicals, such as LNG carriers, FPSO and FSRU. These ships are considered the crown jewels or the olympics of the ship building industry. About 13 shipyards in the world are qualified in making LNG carriers in the world, and they are practically all in the Far East. It isn't just a measure of labor and technology skillset, but also of project management, infrastructure and the tools used. To build the QE carrier, the British shipyard has to order a special gantry from guess where --- China. These gantries have to be transported through a fleet of specialized ships owned by the gantry maker. And that's another strength of the Chinese shipbuilding industry, their ability to come up with a wide breadth of specialized designs for specific purposes, such as say, semi-submersible ships designed to transport other ships. You need these gantries in order to lift and place the modular blocks of the ship such as the island of the aircraft carrier. If you do not have these gantries, how are you going to make your aircraft carrier?

Tam said:

China doing components for commercial aircraft help advance her own industry so quickly that she went from making J-8s to J-20s within a short generation.

Sure you can build nuclear submarines but how deep can it go? Its not whether or not you can build a submarine but the true test of its steel is how deep you can go regardless whether you are conventional or nuclear. For that matter, who has the deepest diving submersibles.

The Yuan is said to have a tested depth of 550 meters. The Soryu is said to have tested a depth of 600 meters. The deepest record is held by the Soviet Oscar class which reached 800 meters. The Soviets are known to use titanium on their submarines.

View attachment 75844

The UK actually has a more viable ship building industry than the US, as European countries tend to have more socialist governments to the shipping industry. They might not be building container ships but they are still building cruise ships and ferries. Babcock, which is going to make the Type 31 frigate, is best known for building ferries.

Egypt does not build high end commercial ships. The bigger the ship is, the greater the stresses it puts onto its frame and this is where structural integrity is tested and that's where the technology comes into play. Seawise Giant, which measures over 450 meters in length, has full weight of over 650,000 tons. How many aircraft carriers is that? Same applies to Egypt same also applies to Turkey. If they build commercial ships, both are in the small potatoes category. By the way, Seawise Giant was made in Japan. In terms of compensated gross tonnage, China has 48% of the world market and South Korea has 28%. Japan has around 10%. The whole of Europe, including the UK, has about 10%. (From Statista).

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If Egypt is to build military ships, it would be the small ones. In fact, this year, they successfully made a corvette. Turkey is making warships but its small, and they are looking to up theirs to the destroyer category.

Your ability to build one big ship is going to relate to how you build other big ships. Some kinds of commercial ships are intensely complicated as they are designed for the management and storage of dangerous chemicals, such as LNG carriers, FPSO and FSRU. These ships are considered the crown jewels or the olympics of the ship building industry. About 13 shipyards in the world are qualified in making LNG carriers in the world, and they are practically all in the Far East. It isn't just a measure of labor and technology skillset, but also of project management, infrastructure and the tools used. To build the QE carrier, the British shipyard has to order a special gantry from guess where --- China. These gantries have to be transported through a fleet of specialized ships owned by the gantry maker. And that's another strength of the Chinese shipbuilding industry, their ability to come up with a wide breadth of specialized designs for specific purposes, such as say, semi-submersible ships designed to transport other ships. You need these gantries in order to lift and place the modular blocks of the ship such as the island of the aircraft carrier. If you do not have these gantries, how are you going to make your aircraft carrier?

Click to expand...

May be buy the gantries from China, like the UK when they constructed the carrier QE.

asif iqbal said:

I can't quote everyone and we are going off topic so mods can move this into relevant thread please

but there is a lack of understanding here between commercial and warship building

China has been building wings and fuselage for Airbus for decades commercial airline, yet ARJ 21 and C919 are proving to be decades long programmes in the making when they do home made, and even home means the landing gears are still outsourced as is over 1000s of other parts

UK has retained what is core to its industry, it cant make steel but it has just bought out Sheffield Forgemasters after £2.6 million take over from MoD, why ? because they can make military grade steel

UK cant make commercial ships yet it can build the Worlds most advanced nuclear submarines, Astute Class + Vanguard Class and now the Dreadnaught class

UK never built a carrier in 3 decades, the industry was dead they said and out comes 2 x 65,000+ ton Carriers with the largest 5th generation naval air wing in the World

Warships for Navy is not related to Commercial shipbuilding two totally different games, yes off course there is overlap as both are same industry but just because one can build containers and tankers doesnt mean they can build warships, btw Egypt has been building commercial ships and they bought the 2 x Mistral Class from France which were set for the Russians who themselves couldn't build LHD

and whoever said Japan and South Korea can build aircraft carriers, yes they can but will they work? we are taking about aircraft carriers here not a re-fitted tanker, both Japan and South Korea are needing the help of the UK for their carrier programmes

lets take for example just the deck coating requirement for the F35B heat exhaust at 1500C, a company called Monitor Coatings came to find the solution, a Thermal Metal Spray System consists of a metallic compound of aluminium and titanium , Specialist robots were developed to apply the coating. Powdered metal was fired through a jet of plasma at temperatures of around 10,000C. The molten droplets then flatten and solidify, creating a tough coating

the programme took 2 years of testing, and endless remaking of the metallic compound

and yes I know what the reply will, oh yes China can do it , South Korea can do it and so can Japan but they wish not too

well I can tell you these things come from a gene pool of knowledge decades in the making which these counties simply dont have

Rosyth in Scotland did it and Govan is doing the Type 26 programme the list goes on

btw Turkey also has a very good shipbuilding programme, they bought Spanish design for their LHD

Easy to claim things without knowing the details of how a warship is actually built

Click to expand...

An aircraft carrier is a large, complex naval ship, yes, but there is no secret ingredients to building a carrier if you have a competent shipyard with access to the relevant subsuppliers for the carrier's subsystems.

Your attribution of cause and effect is entirely reversed -- you are making it seem like the nations which have built carriers before have only done so because they have "capable naval shipbuilding industries" and that nations which haven't built carriers before have not done so because their "industries are insufficiently capable".

Whereas in truth, the nations which have built carriers only build them because they are asked to because their navy requires carriers or because their navies can fund them, and how effectively a nation is able to build a carrier (or indeed, any other naval ship) is a reflection of the capability of their shipbuilding industry itself.

Gloire_bb said:

Offtop: as far as Koreans tell, the other one(by HHI) is the preferred option. The much larger one, actually(~QE-sized). Which only reinforces the point.

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It only reinforces the point that shipyards will build the ship that a navy deems they can afford and which fits their national strategies and national budgets most effectively.

It does not say anything about the ability of the shipyard itself to build either ship option.

banjex said:

Just a small nitpick, but this was only true for the early builds. New builds are from scratch.

Click to expand...

They have to start somewhere --- existing blueprints --- to rebuild their ship building expertise which is only right, since they know the problem, they are working to rectify the problem and they are determined to do so. The Arc7 LNG carriers for their Yamal LNG project the Russians allotted to build for themselves (others are fanned out to China and South Korea should domestic builds fail) should be considered a challenge they have chosen as a national goal and determined to overcome. These things are about 300 meters in length with a dead weight of 80,000 tons using possibly EH36 grade steel. Surprisingly ambitious. If they succeed in building this, this would be a major comeback of the Russian shipbuilding industry.

Bltizo said:

An aircraft carrier is a large, complex naval ship, yes, but there is no secret ingredients to building a carrier if you have a competent shipyard with access to the relevant subsuppliers for the carrier's subsystems.

Your attribution of cause and effect is entirely reversed -- you are making it seem like the nations which have built carriers before have only done so because they have "capable naval shipbuilding industries" and that nations which haven't built carriers before have not done so because their "industries are insufficiently capable".

Whereas in truth, the nations which have built carriers only build them because they are asked to because their navy requires carriers or because their navies can fund them, and how effectively a nation is able to build a carrier (or indeed, any other naval ship) is a reflection of the capability of their shipbuilding industry itself.


It only reinforces the point that shipyards will build the ship that a navy deems they can afford and which fits their national strategies and national budgets most effectively.

It does not say anything about the ability of the shipyard itself to build either ship option.

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lets not get nationalism in the way of logical thinking, No, are you saying China could have reached this level of Carrier construction without the Varyag?

Chinese Carrier programme goes way back to the 1980s but it wasn't until they got the Varyag did they really start to increase the pace, doesn't matter how advanced the commercial sector gets in China without Varyag there would not have been 003 in 2021

same goes for the commercial airline sector, but in reverse, just because you can build fighter jets does not mean you can build a commercial airliner, simply because of the safety issues and complexity of civilian certification, just look at Y-10 started in 1980s deemed to difficult scrapped

asif iqbal said:

lets not get nationalism in the way of logical thinking, No, are you saying China could have reached this level of Carrier construction without the Varyag?

Chinese Carrier programme goes way back to the 1980s but it wasn't until they got the Varyag did they really start to increase the pace, doesn't matter how advanced the commercial sector gets in China without Varyag there would not have been 003 in 2021

same goes for the commercial airline sector, but in reverse, just because you can build fighter jets does not mean you can build a commercial airliner, simply because of the safety issues and complexity of civilian certification, just look at Y-10 started in 1980s deemed to difficult scrapped

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Um... how is nationalism present in @Bltizo's argument? I think what he is trying to say, to paraphrase, is that a credible civilian shipbuilding industry helps when it comes to building ACs. He didn't say it could lead to 003 without the Varyag, just that an AC could be built regardless if it's inferior to 003 or not. The only thing stopping that is the political/military will for one.

I'm not sure what you mean about the commercial airliner part? A lot of countries that have commercial airliner manufacturers also build fighter jets. Oh, and China is building commercial airliners too. And before you say: "Well it's not 100% indigenous", they still built one - which is the crux of your last argument.

From small wooden boat in 1921 to giant aircraft carrier in 2020 The story of Chinese Shipyard. A rare ground view of Jiangnan shipyard.
The main content of this program: In 1921, a small boat on the South Lake in Jiaxing carried the firm belief in the rise of the Chinese nation and set sail. After a hundred years of struggle, the Red Boat remains the same. On the vast sea frontiers of China, the mighty array of warships of various types witnessed the rise of China's shipbuilding industry from shallow waters to the deep blue of the century.

asif iqbal said:

lets not get nationalism in the way of logical thinking, No, are you saying China could have reached this level of Carrier construction without the Varyag?

Chinese Carrier programme goes way back to the 1980s but it wasn't until they got the Varyag did they really start to increase the pace, doesn't matter how advanced the commercial sector gets in China without Varyag there would not have been 003 in 2021

same goes for the commercial airline sector, but in reverse, just because you can build fighter jets does not mean you can build a commercial airliner, simply because of the safety issues and complexity of civilian certification, just look at Y-10 started in 1980s deemed to difficult scrapped

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This isn't about nationalism but about common sense.

For China, what I'm saying is they would've had no chance to even fit out Varyag to become Liaoning in the first place if they didn't have a competent shipbuilding industry that had emerged in the 2000s.

If they didn't have a competent civilian shipbuilding industry, their efforts to build CV-17 and 003 would have been much more stymied, delayed, inefficient and lackluster, with or without Varyag.

One can look at India to see a nation, which on paper has had decades of operating small sized aircraft carriers, yet it has taken them far longer than reasonable to build INS Vikrant -- but if they had a foundation of a very competent civilian shipbuilding industry, I guarantee you it would've been far less painful for them.