On the morning of October 19, the domestically produced super-large-diameter slurry balance shield tunneling machine "Jincheng No. 1," with an excavation diameter of 13.8 meters, rolled off the production line in Changsha. The shield machine will be used for tunneling construction on the Jingu Haihe River Tunnel of the Tianjin-Weifang High-Speed Railway, supporting the construction of the Beijing-Shanghai auxiliary corridor and the coastal corridor of the "Eight Vertical and Eight Horizontal" high-speed railway network.

The "Jincheng No. 1" shield machine has a total length of approximately 120 meters and a total weight of about 3,200 tons. It is currently the slurry balance shield machine with the longest single-head tunneling distance and the largest excavation diameter in Tianjin. The cutterhead coating design is inspired by the "Ruyi Jingu Bang" (the As-You-Will Gold-Banded Cudgel) from the traditional Chinese mythological story "Journey to the West," with "Jingu" being a homophone of "Jingu" (Jingu).

It is understood that the Jingu Haihe River Tunnel is the only shield tunnel on the entire Tianjin-Weifang High-Speed Railway line, and also the first high-speed railway large-diameter shield tunnel in the Tianjin area with the longest single-head tunneling distance. The "Jincheng No. 1" shield machine will launch from an ultra-shallow buried stratum with 8.5 meters of overburden, tunneling northward for 6,014 meters in a single head. During this period, it will successively pass beneath a series of major risk sources, including the Dagu Drainage River, the Dongdagu Station of the Southwest Ring Railway, the Jingu First Line Overpass, the Central Avenue Overpass, the Haihe River, and a seismic fault zone, before receiving at the south side of the planned Huxin Island Park.

According to Liu Zhijian, project manager of China Railway 14th Bureau Group, in order to ensure smooth tunneling of the shield machine, China Railway 14th Bureau Group and CRCC Heavy Industry Group jointly developed this super-large-diameter slurry balance shield machine. Its cutterhead is equipped with a continuous wear detection device, which can realize real-time detection of cutter wear during the tunneling process. Operators can promptly adjust shield tunneling parameters, improve tunneling efficiency, and ensure construction safety.

As an important component of China's "Eight Vertical and Eight Horizontal" Beijing-Shanghai auxiliary corridor and coastal corridor, the Tianjin-Weifang High-Speed Railway starts from Tianjin Binhai Station in the north and ends at Weifang North Station of the Jinan-Qingdao High-Speed Railway in the south. It is a key project for further implementing national strategies such as the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and the development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and for improving the comprehensive transportation system of the Beijing-Shanghai corridor.