At present, 1Mn18Cr18N steel retaining ring forgings used in thermal power and nuclear power units have not been professionally produced in batches in China. For decades, all the retaining rings required by domestic generator set manufacturers have been imported. After the 2008 Sichuan earthquake, with the strong support of the Guanghan Municipal Party Committee and Municipal People’s Government of the Communist Party of China, our company invested more than 80 million yuan, requisitioned 65 acres of land, and started construction of 3 to 1000 MW thermal power and nuclear power plants with an annual output of about 550 pieces of 300 to 1000 MW guard rings. The retaining ring production line has been constructed successively with a 150-ton and 100-ton standard workshops, an 8,000-ton forging press and corresponding supporting cranes, heating furnaces, operating machines, processing equipment and testing equipment. After 2 years of hard work, the production line Has been successfully put into production.

    Our company's 1000MW-class retaining ring project belongs to the encouraged project supported by the national industry catalog. The production line of the project was put into operation and the 8000-ton press was completed, filling the domestic gap and entering the world's advanced technology field of new material forging manufacturing. Feedback information on the installation and use of 50～300MW 1Mn18Cr18N steel retaining rings provided by several domestic electric machinery factories shows that our company is capable of completely replacing imports, changing the situation of long-term dependence on imports and being restricted by others, and making due contributions for the domestic thermal power and nuclear power unit manufacturing industries contribution.