Welding a brighter future

Li Wanjun said he can help realize the Chinese Dream of national rejuvenation through his welding gun.

Li, 49, is a master of high-speed train welding at CRRC Changchun Railway Vehicles Co, a State-owned train manufacturer based in Jilin province.

"Realizing the Chinese Dream is not just a slogan. It needs all of us frontier workers to work hard. For me, it is using my welding gun well to help manufacture more and better undercarriages," said the delegate to the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.

The undercarriages Li and his colleagues weld can affect a train's speed, stability and safety, according to CRRC Changchun Railway, and the manufacturing technology is considered one of the nine core technologies for making high-speed trains, the company said. Li began with the company in 1987 and was sent to a welding workshop, which he hated at first.

Welders had to wear heavy clothes and carry welding guns that shoot out hot flames. Every time he walked out of the workshop, he was covered in sweat.

With the guidance of his father, who was also a welder at the company, Li realized the importance of his job－a key to manufacturing trains and ensuring their safety－and made up his mind to become a skilled worker.

He practiced hard and constantly looked for ways to improve his welding skills, and started to win skill competitions after his second year at the company.

"If I didn't weld successfully, the impact would be tremendous," he said.

After 30 years of experience, Li now has become a welding expert who welds steel perfectly and has participated in many key welding missions for high-speed trains running at home and abroad.

Based on the experience, Li has established standards for more than 20 welding techniques for undercarriages and solved more than 100 technological problems, 25 of which were granted national patents. "From him, I understand the report more thoroughly and know what we grassroots workers need to do, and that is to improve our skills further to make our products more competitive," said He Yan, one of Li's apprentices at CRRC Changchun Railway.