He takes the utmost care of his apprentices at his “National Skills Master Studio”

Manufacturing workshop of high-speed EMUs in CRVC

A Yue sword,renowned for its sharpness, would not be keen enough without quenching or hardening

“When a stream comes across obstacles, it makes waves.” Li Wanjunappreciates this sentiment and he doesn’t gloss over the low points in his life. 

In 1987, when Li Wanjun was 19 years old,he had just graduated from a vocational school and was assigned to the water tank section of the welding workshop at CRVC. Restricted by the production conditions in those years, a popular doggerel in the workshop ran, “Seen from a distance, it looks like a refugee. A little closer, it looks like a beggar. Upon close inspection, they are the workers from the water tank section.”

If you didn’t experience it personally, you would have no idea how painful, dirty, and exhausting the job is. “I had to lie on the oily steel plates for operations all day long, with the welding torch in my hands spraying flames with temperatures of 2300 ℃. When the bean-like welding flakes fell, my clothes turned oily and developed holes here and there. The face mask became pitch-dark after only a short time. In the summer, we always perspired heavily, and in winter we wore a suit of ice when standing in the pool to add pressure for a welded water tank.”

Among 28 fellow workers who entered the factory at the same time, 25 tried every possible means to transfer to other posts within a year. Li Wanjun, who had no “social connections” to transfer his post, “felt very sad and confused because he only had the bitter and tiring hours to look forward to, no prosperous future.”

Li Shizhong, Li Wanjun’s father, was one of the first generations of workers at CRVC who had manufactured the first passenger coach and the first subway train in China. He had been voted model laborer of the factory seven times. At that time, in the assembling and welding workshop where Li Shizhong worked, there were also two model laborers. One was the monitor of the machine maintenance team, Qu Weijian, who was a national model worker. The other was the section chief, Zhang Daoxiang, who was a Ministry of Railways model laborer.

“Now that I have nowhere to go, it’s easier to work hard to keep pace with the model laborers and be determined to make a mark!”A favorite verse came to Li Wanjun’s mind, “Why do streams reach the sea? It’s because, upon reaching an obstacle, they settle down to slowly gather strength, improving themselves and finally overcoming the obstacle.”

Since then, whenever he found a skillful master, Li Wanjun would stand aside and observe. After work, he would look around for scraps, put them into silk bags, carry his“treasure”bags weighing more than 25 kg per bag on his back, and walk across the factory, a distance of 1.5 km. He then asked his father, who was a planer, to help him process them into groove test pieces. Afterwards, he would carry them back to the workshop to practice from dawn until night, using up nearly 300 welding rods every day.

“The factory required each worker to weld 100 water tanks per month and I would weld an additional 20 pieces. I also liked to change into all kinds of positions to weld. As a result, the canvas workwear would be worn out very easily”, Li Wanjun told the reporter that the factory gave each worker one suit of work clothes every two years at that time. However,he would wear out four or five suits in a year. His work clothes were never enough, so he had to buy extra suits at the market at his own expense.

During an exercise, some slag accidentally pierced Li Wanjun’s left eye. He rushed to a hospital to have it picked. After finishing medicating his left eye each day, he persisted in practicing with his right eye. “I think if I can weld well with one eye, I would do better with two eyes,” he said with humour. 

A Yue sword, known for its sharpness, would not be keen enough without quenching or hardening. Human wisdom cannot be obtained without enduring challenging studies. In 1988,CRVC cooperated with the German Democratic Republic to manufacture soft sleeper cars. One day, the section chief found two beautiful air cylinders for an East German car just welded by Li Wanjun. He interrupted Li Wanjun, saying, “Stop welding now. Start welding when the foreign party comes here for a visit. If your performance decreases and you do worse than these two pieces, you will spoil the visit!” Li Wanjun replied with a smile and full confidence, “Please, rest assured, no matter how many I weld, I promise to do them all with the same quality!” When the experts from East Germany stepped into the factory, they were indeed deeply attracted to Li Wanjun’s welding techniques, gathering next to him for a long time and watching him work, hesitant to leave. 

In the second year after beginning work, Li Wanjun easily won first prize in a workshop competition, and then silver prize in a factory-wide competition. A writer in the factory described him like this: “In his hands, invisible needles firmly but gently govern dazzling arcs between the cold and hard steels, dancing

as swiftly as a frightened swan goose or as composed as the Mountain Tai. He freely interprets his craft and demonstrates the stunts and the outstanding talents of an embroiderer of steel.”

“I am responsive to encouragement. Ever since that comment, I possessed a greater desire to learn technology and began to really love the profession of welding!” Li Wanjun smiled and said, “Hobbies are powerful. Combined with the driving power of endurance, and especially with the experience of gaining honours and a higher social status as a technical worker, a sound foundation is formed, allowing one to pursue diligently. You always think that you can perform even better.”