Silver welding robots stand steadily, their flexible mechanical arms rotate and retract, and blue-white welding arcs shine one after another in the workshop, which is particularly dazzling.
Recently, reporters visited Shandong Lugong Machinery Group, a national-level specialized and new “little giant” enterprise located in Shahe Town, Laizhou City, and visited the vivid practice of traditional machinery manufacturing enterprises activating new momentum and moving towards high-end through technological transformation and innovation.
The Yantai government work report at the beginning of this year clearly stated that “improving the modern industrial system, cultivating and developing new productive forces according to local conditions”, and promoting the transformation of the equipment manufacturing industry into digital intelligence.
As an important industrial town in Yantai, Laizhou has anchored the goal of “creating a “ten billion support” trend for key industries” and guided the machinery manufacturing industry to follow the path of differentiated development, high-quality improvement, and new energy transformation.
Laizhou is the western gateway for Yantai to integrate into the national strategy and is known as the “hometown of small machinery industry”.
As an industrial core area, Shahe Town always adheres to technological reform first, promotes the transformation and upgrading of traditional enterprises, and keeps old industries glowing with new vitality.
Shandong Lugong Machinery Group has been deeply involved in the manufacturing of small loaders, excavators and other equipment for many years and is now a benchmark enterprise in the industry.
Entering the company’s product exhibition hall, loaders with novel shapes and excellent performance are neatly arranged, ranging from basic models to high-end smart models. This intuitively demonstrates the company’s R&D and innovation achievements in recent years, and also reflects the firm pace of Laizhou’s machinery manufacturing industry to climb to the high end.
“In 2025, we will implement ’empty the cage and replace the bird’ and invest 60 million yuan to promote the intelligent upgrading and transformation project with an annual output of 5,000 loaders, allowing the old factory to run at a new speed.” Lin Xiaoming, director of the office of Shandong Lugong Machinery Group, introduced the company’s core idea of promoting upgrading through technological transformation.
In the production workshop of Lugong Machinery, there is no noisy scene of traditional manufacturing enterprises. Instead, there is an orderly scene of efficient operation of intelligent equipment. The crisp sound of metal collision and the steady hum of machine operation are intertwined into the progressive movement of traditional manufacturing industry to transform into new quality productivity.
Stepping into the welding workshop, a hot industrial atmosphere hits your face.
I saw the robot moving accurately along the preset trajectory. The moment the welding gun came into contact with the steel, sparks flew everywhere, and the welding seam was smooth, uniform and full, without manual intervention in the whole process.
“In the past, manual welding was not only labor-intensive, but also prone to problems such as uneven welds and pores, and a high scrap rate. Today’s robotic welding systems are extremely accurate.” Lin Xiaoming introduced.
In the blanking workshop, there is also an intelligent working scene.
The automated CNC robot is equipped with a high-definition visual recognition system, which is like having “fierce eyes” to quickly scan the workpiece and accurately locate the installation location of the workpiece.
The robotic arm grabs the workpiece accurately and firmly fixes the workpiece on the workstation with even force. Every movement is precise and precise.
In the workshop, workers are no longer operators who repeat heavy work, but are guardians of equipment and monitors of processes. Several workers patrol back and forth, and can grasp the operating status of the entire production line in real time through the touch screen.
“Through technological transformation, equipment updates, and workshop process re-arrangement, the scrap rate has been greatly reduced and efficiency improved.” Lin Xiaoming told reporters that during this intelligent upgrade, the company purchased 74 sets of new advanced equipment such as robot welding systems, laser cutting machines, and intelligent processing centers to fully build a digital workshop.
The changes after the technological transformation are reflected in every key data: the overall production efficiency has increased by more than 25%, the product qualification rate has increased from 97% to 99.5%, energy consumption has been reduced by 20%, and the annual output value is expected to increase by 20 million yuan.
This set of eye-catching data is not only the fruitful results of technological transformation and innovation of enterprises, but also a vivid epitome of Yantai’s traditional machinery manufacturing industry cultivating new productivity and achieving high-quality improvement.
From “manufacturing” to “intelligent manufacturing”, from tradition to high-end, the transformation of Lugong Machinery is a microcosm of Laizhou’s promotion of the transformation and upgrading of the machinery manufacturing industry.
At present, Laizhou is closely following Yantai City’s deployment requirements for cultivating new productive forces and building a modern industrial system, based on the basic advantages of the machinery manufacturing industry, adhering to government guidance and enterprise main body, encouraging and supporting enterprises to increase investment in technological transformation, strengthen innovative research and development, optimize product structure, and promote the transformation of traditional machinery manufacturing industry into high-end, intelligent and green.
Nowadays, in Yantai, more and more machinery manufacturing companies like Lugong Machinery are getting rid of the old path of low-end homogeneous competition, deeply exploring subdivided fields, increasing investment in R&D, conquering key technologies, and actively exploring overseas markets.
Lugong Machinery’s products have been exported to more than 80 countries and regions. With its excellent quality and leading technology, it competes with international brands in the international market, demonstrating the core strength of “Yantai Industry”.
New quality productivity, the core lies in innovation, and the key lies in high quality.
Standing at a new starting point of development, Laizhou is continuing to deepen the machinery manufacturing industry with firmer determination and more pragmatic measures, empowering industrial upgrading with technological transformation, activating development momentum with innovation, constantly cultivating and strengthening new productive forces, promoting the machinery manufacturing industry to achieve higher quality, more efficient and more sustainable development, and contributing Laizhou’s strength to Yantai City’s improvement of modern industrial system and promotion of high-quality development.
