You Got it JK. I was standing on the centreline of the engine, looking down the cylinder bore (it was the forward most unit opened up) and I naturally sighted down the wear marks in the liner surface, just like looking down a gun barrel, the crankshaft was off centre. At first I thought it must be a...

JK

You are on the right lines, but think bigger.
BP.

Same ship as fault finding 2. (Gonio) Main engine from M.A.N. built under licence in the former Yugoslavia / Croatia. Before I joined the ship I was told that every couple of years, the engine threw a connecting rod and crosshead out of the side of the engine, and that it would be a bonus if I could...

We have wondered off from the original purifier tale, but the end result of that was that when the bowl had been stripped down, still attached to the purifier, I tested the operating water and only got a feeble dribble. I got the crew to remove the bowl, which they had never done before, and the bra...

I used to think something similar myself, but, when you think about it, if you have several 10 mm diameter holes right through a filter, the oil will take the line of least resistance, and even if some goes through the mesh, the debris filtered out will not stay on the upstream side of the filter, b...

Don't even joke about it Martin, I was Chief on an old tanker with 2 V12 Pielsticks, the original L.O purifiers ( 1 per engine) had long been out of service and a single, totally indaquate, little purifier installed instead. AS a consequence the main engine L.O. filters got dirty very quickly. This ...

There were 4 identical thrusters and only one was tripping out.... Eventually I found the problem was a faulty overload unit in the main breaker. The common problem I found with most ex Communist block Engineers is that they are unable to see that some problems would affect all identical pieces of m...

Every time I rejoined that ship there was a "surprise" for me. One time I joined and the other crew had had problms with one Electric Stern Thruster tripping out on overload. The ship hads been working for 16 years in the North Sea, and it was Summer time. There were 4 identical thrusters,...

15 years ago I was "on board co-ordinator" (Company spy) on an oil tanker owned and manned in Batumi, Georgian Republic, (Former USSR). I represented the British management company. It was a very scary trip. The Chief Engineer informed me that one of the Laval Purifiers had to be cleaned m...

When my relief explained the situation to me he was unable to give any logical reason why the problem was caused by low water pressure. He just kept insisting that the problem was due to low water pressure. My first concern was safety, the hydrophore tank is a pressure vessel and its working pressur...

A couple of years ago I was Chief Engineer on a Platform Supply Vessel. The ship was fitted with 3 identical Mitsubishi Purifiers (Westfalia clones) one for the L.O. on each main engine and one for Gas Oil. All 3 were supplied with a common high pressure water supply from the Hydrophore/ Pneupress s...

Probably any natural fibre coated in Tallow will do, I don't think it does any harm to give the packing a liberal coating of grease when you fit it either. Obvious key points for anyone not used to this old type of seal is that the shaft should be polished as smooth as possible so it does not shred ...

One thing I didn't mention earlier is that if the engine has a camshaft drive chain, the tension in that will try to lift the crankshaft and bend it. This bend will always be in the same direction in relation to the engine , but will vary its direction relative to the crankshaft as it turns.(same as...

Hi Guys, I can see how the surface roughness of the fractures surfaces ensure perfect alignement when the rod is re-assembled. For the fracture to fit together perfectly when the rod is re-assembled it must be a "short", brittle fracture, this implies that the cast material is not at all d...

One important function of the double bottom tank is structural strength. The first ship to be fitted with double bottom tanks was Brunel's S.S. Great Britain and she went aground on the Irish Coast on her maiden voyage and survived intact for a year before she was salvaged, and she is still with us ...