Through the introduction of international advanced high performance high speed rail brake project, this project will produce high-speed rail braking system core components for the trains with a speed of above 160 km/h.

The project belongs to the Chinese government encouraged projects listed as city rail transportation equipment of the fifteenth item in the "industrial structure adjustment guidance catalogue (2011 amendment version)". The fifteenth item includes railway vehicle AC traction drive system, braking system and the core components project as stated in the sixth clause.

The project also listed in the "development and industrialization of key materials (major action)" project belongs to the high performance composite materials industry new materials industry in Chinese "12^th Five Year national strategic emerging industry development plan".

In 2011, the former Ministry of Railway has made a plan to achieve more than 50% rail trains to reach a speed of 160 km/h and above within 3-5 year. This plan has proposed more strict technical requirements to the train brake materials. The existing synthetic brake with graphite, metal powder or metal fiber as the main raw materials cannot meet the needs of the train speed boosting.

The carbon fiber composite brake material has high strength, moderate elasticity modulus, good heat resistance, light weight, low expansion coefficient, abrasion resistance and other advantages. And, at present, all the brake systems used for the fast high-speed train with a speed of 160km/h or above are relying on the import products.

The high performance high speed rail brake developed by Shandong University has made use of process optimization. All the performance indicators have reached the design requirements, the products have passed through the product testing by the quality supervision and inspection center of the former Ministry of Railway locomotive vehicle inspection station. The technology has reached the international advanced level, can replace the imported products.

In conclusion, to accelerate the promotion of high strength, high modulus carbon fiber composite material in the field of mass transit applications is in line with the national industrial policy. According to the planning by the former Ministry of Railway, the number of the rail vehicles with a running speed of 160 km/h and above will reach 15,000 units. Each car needs 32 pieces of brake that makes the total of over 480,000 pieces of brakes. Therefore, the development of carbon fiber composite material high speed rail brake has broad market prospect.

The project covers a total area of about 33333.33 square meters. The project plans to build the Distributed Control System (DCS) automated production line, production workshop, friction materials innovation platform database, production process flow raw materials mixing system etc... The project has a total planned investment of about 250 million Yuan (US$ 43.33 million), including fixed assets investment 200 million Yuan (US$ 333.33 million), and the floating capital of 50 million Yuan (US$ 8.33 million). After the project is completed, it is estimated that the annual sales income will reach 200 million Yuan (US$ 333.33 million) with a profit and tax of 40 million Yuan (US$ 6.67 million).