China has begun replacing the main cables of the world's largest single-dish FAST (Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope) with fully domestic analogs for the first time. While these critical components were previously imported, China is now utilizing its own technology. This is reported by Ixbt.com reports .
The telescope's 30-ton receiver cabin is suspended by six massive steel cables. This system allows for high-precision control of the receiver. Engineers are replacing the six main cables, which have a total length of nearly 4 kilometers, with each weighing over six tons.
The cables operate under extreme conditions: the receiver cabin is located at a height of 140 meters and can move over a distance of more than 200 meters. Every day, the cables face hundreds of bends and impulse loads, so their durability must meet the requirements for five years of continuous operation.
To create the new cables, the Chinese team conducted over 62,000 pulley tests and nearly 200,000 load tests. In August 2025, the domestic cables successfully passed all stages. This achievement not only reduced foreign dependency but also strengthened national engineering capabilities.
Launched in 2016, the FAST radio telescope has become one of the world's most important scientific tools for searching for pulsars, studying interstellar gas, and analyzing cosmic phenomena.
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