Inertial Instrumentation Industry Acceleration

The inertial instrumentation industry is a comprehensive, cross-cutting, high-tech, advanced manufacturing industry. It is mainly applied to the angular motion and linear motion of sensitive motion bodies in inertial space to obtain information on the attitude, position, and speed of moving bodies. Aerospace, navigation and petroleum, coal, automobile manufacturing, electromechanical industry, electronic technology, control science and information technology are all widely used. Inertial instrumentation technology has become one of the important signs to measure the scientific and technological level of a country and the strength of national defense.

Inertial instruments mainly include the most basic accelerometers, gyroscopes, and inertial measurement combinations composed of accelerometers and gyroscopes, and inertial navigation systems composed of the combination and settlement units. There are many types of inertial instruments, and accelerometers mainly include quartz flexible accelerometers, liquid float pendulum accelerometers, microelectromechanical accelerometers, vibrating wire accelerometers, and vibrating beam accelerometers. Gyroscopes are mainly liquid-float, power-tuned, piezoelectric, micro-electromechanical, fiber optic, laser and other types.

In the new century, China is confronted with complex national security issues such as the reunification of the motherland, the defense of Nansha, and the boycott of US intervention. Precise guidance of guided missiles places higher requirements on inertial instrumentation. It is necessary to strengthen national defense construction and make every preparation for winning a local war under high-tech conditions. The future war is an informationized war under the conditions of nuclear deterrence. According to the characteristics of this war, we must focus on the development of precision-guided weapons to achieve precision strikes and non-contact operations in mid-range and long-range; vigorously improve the air defense, anti-missile, penetration prevention, electronic, and information warfare systems, and strengthen the air-to-air and sea-based systems in local combat areas. The ability to make electromagnetic rights. The development of inertial instrumentation is the key to strengthening the weapon system and improving combat capabilities. Foreign liquid floatation, air floatation, static electricity and power tuning gyroscopes are very mature and widely used. At present, the random drift of the United States electrostatic gyroscope is better than 0.001 (°)/h, the random drift of the liquid float gyroscope is 0.001 (°)/h, and the random drift of the power tuning gyroscope is 0.006 (°)/h. In aerospace and missile applications, Germany and France use flexible gyroscope platforms and strapdown systems for their applications. The United States is based on the platform consisting of flexible and liquid floating gyros and the strapdown inertial navigation system. The laser gyro technology of the United States and France has been applied to aerospace and aviation, and most of them constitute the Strapdown Inertial Navigation System. The bias stability is better than 0.01 (°)/h. Due to the insensitivity to many error terms of electromechanical gyroscopes and the wide range of dynamic motion from 0.01 (°)/h to 1000 (°)/s, the laser gyroscope is suitable for SINS. The application ratio is similar to that of the power-tuned gyroscope, the liquid float gyroscope, and the electrostatic gyroscope. Fiber optic gyroscopes are the best inertial devices for strapdown inertial navigation systems. Due to the ease of integration, the cost can be greatly reduced, and thus it is highly competitive.

Triaxialization, integration, digitization, and modularization are the development directions of fiber optic gyros. Fiber optic gyroscopes have been widely used in the United States, Germany, and Japan. With the rapid development of the world economy and science and technology, micronization and even higher requirements for nanotechnology are constantly being proposed in the fields of information, biology, aviation, aerospace and environmental control. This new micro-nano technology will inevitably lead to major breakthroughs in humans' ability to recognize and transform the world. Micron technology has been developed and applied in the field of inertial technology. Since the 1980s, some countries in the United States, Japan, and Western Europe have attached great importance to the research and development of micron and nanotechnology. A new type of micro-silicon vibratory gyroscope was first developed by Dreber Laboratories in the United States in the late 1980s, and its drift has reached 10 (°)/h, and it can be practically approached by 1 (°)/h in the near future. At present, the cantilever type can achieve a bias stability of 0.1mg or less, a range of 100g, and a scale factor error of 0.01%. The micro-silicon inertial device is a low-cost, low-to-medium precision range and will have a broad market in military and civilian dual-use technology.

Laser gyroscopes and fiber optic gyroscopes are a new generation of inertial devices. Laser gyroscopes use optical path difference to measure rotational angular velocity (Sagnac effect). At present, high-precision laser gyros require that the reflectance of the mirror is better than 99.95%, and the scattering rate is 0.01% to 0.02%. The degree of stability of the scaling factor depends on the size of the blocking threshold. In order to improve the precision of the laser snake device, it is necessary to adopt a speed biasing technique. Now, laser gyros have been widely used in civil aircraft and military helicopters, and they have begun to replace the power tuning gyroscopes (DTG).

Although the rapid development of demand in the Automotive Industry, consumer electronics, and petroleum exploration has driven the rapid growth in demand for the inertial instrumentation industry. As an important component of the inertial guidance system, the inertial device has a very broad application prospect in the guidance weapon system.

However, high-end inertial instruments are products that are prohibited from exporting. The technical level of domestic inertial instrument manufacturers varies. Most manufacturing companies are lagging in technology. Manual Assembly still occupies a considerable proportion, and technological development capability is insufficient. In some important areas, domestic levels are relatively low compared to the international advanced level. The large gap is mainly manifested in: The gap in technology accumulation The inertial instrumentation companies with international advanced level have mostly a long history of research and development, and have formed technical advantages after long-term technical accumulation. The main R&D forces of inertial instruments and meters in China are concentrated in a few specialized military enterprises and research institutes. Most companies have a short history of R&D and small scale, and there is a gap between technology accumulation and international advanced level.

Base material gaps The development of high-end inertial instrumentation requires precision molds and high-performance basic raw materials. At present, China's precision hardware, plastics, and wire rods are gradually narrowing the gap with the international level, but there is still a large gap between the level of precision molds and high-performance sensitive materials, which restricts the improvement of China's inertial instrumentation technology.

Insufficient investment in R&D The development and production enterprises of inertial instruments and meters in China are generally based on services for the industry. They lack systematic and sustainable R&D ideas. They rely mainly on national inputs and cannot guarantee large-scale investment in R&D on their own.

In recent years, with the rapid development of the automotive industry, consumer electronics, aerospace, and military equipment, China's inertial instrumentation market has grown at the same pace and has become one of the fastest growing markets in the world. After years of catching up with some high-end manufacturing companies, the gap between the level of research and development and manufacturing and the international advanced level has gradually narrowed, and some technologies have even led the world.

China's inertial instrumentation industry has entered the stage of marketization competition, and each company is operating in a market-oriented manner, but the development of high- and low-end products in its market is not balanced. High-end products are mainly used in aerospace, aviation, navigation, weapons and other technical fields, production has many varieties, large quantities of features, but its production of one or two companies, the gross margin of products is generally high. While the low gross profit margin of low-end products, the development of new products lags behind. In recent years, companies that have introduced foreign low-end product manufacturing technologies have emerged. Their products are mainly used in automobiles and consumer electronics. The value of their products is relatively low, and competition with large foreign companies is fierce.

At present, for inertial instruments, the favorable factors are gradually increasing. Informatization is the major trend of economic and social development in the world today. It has become China’s basic strategy to drive mechanization through information and achieve leap-forward development. The next five years will be a crucial period for the replacement of electronic technology and products in China. The support of the national industrial policies will improve China's informatization equipment and system integration capabilities. In the next five years, the domestic market for inertial instrumentation is promising, mainly due to the continuous expansion of downstream application industries and the rapid growth in demand. The continuous improvement of downstream industry products has brought new demands to the inertial instrumentation industry. Some high-end product manufacturers have introduced technologically advanced production equipment, introduced advanced production equipment, continuously improved the technical performance of products, and developed new products to meet market demands. As a result, technology-leading manufacturers can obtain more profits, ensure continued investment in R&D and equipment, and maintain their dominant position. At the same time, the increase in technological content has also increased the barriers to entry for the industry, avoiding vicious competition in the industry and ensuring the healthy development of the industry. The concentration of domestic industries is accelerating. In view of the improvement of product quality awareness, the application units of inertial instrumentation products put new demands on the construction of product quality systems while paying attention to prices, and raised higher levels of research and development capabilities, delivery deadlines, and quality assurance capabilities of production companies. The requirements require companies of similar size to provide supporting services. Therefore, the small-scale production enterprises have a smaller and smaller living space, and the scale of the dominant enterprises has grown stronger. The concentration of the domestic inertial instrumentation industry has become increasingly high.