Thanks again.
One can install pre-lube on anything, and I probably will.
The CAT weighs around 4,200 pounds with gear, versus 12,000 for the Lister.
No one would call 4,200 pounds for 400hp a lightweight engine. I should add
that 400hp (which we may never use) is the "run flat out until you have to
change the oil" rating. The same block is available in various ratings up
to 800hp.
I don't think your friend's ship's engine uses 6000psi air to start. That
would be 16,000,000 pounds thrust on the 5' piston. 60-100psi or so would
be more typical of the air starts I've seen.
I've always like air start (that is, with valves -- not an air operated
starter motor) as it seemed elegant to use the pistons themselves, rather
than this little electric motor. I also like the fact that on vessels
smaller than your friend's, you can often hand crank a compressor to do a
dead ship start. (Fintry does this with a spring starter on the Perkins
6-354 that used to be a genset and now will be an hydraulic power pack -- it
has an electric starter also). Of course you have to have a separate valve
train for air, so it's probably more complicated than an electric starter,
even if you count the batteries and alternator. On a big engine, though, you
don't have much choice.
If you ever get a chance, go aboard one of the Liberty ships, or any of the
old triple expansion steamers -- the third cylinder is enormous.....
--
Jim Woodward
www.mvFintry.com
..
"Larry W4CSC" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 9 Nov 2003 08:02:07 -0500, "Jim Woodward" jameslwoodward at
attbi dot com wrote:
To start it, you go down in the engine room, turn on the lube oil (remote
dry sump), the seawater main, and the 24v to the starter, spin a wheel
on
the front to decompress, bar the flywheel over a couple of times to make
sure everything's free, and push a button on the "Motormatic" box.
Relays
start clicking, the prelube pump (24v) starts, and oil pressure comes up.
When oil pressure hits 50psi, the starter engages. After a quarter turn
or
so, you spin off the decompress and it starts. The prelube pump stops.
You
turn off the 24v to the starter and let it warm up for a few minutes. You
can shut it down from the wheelhouse, but you have to go down and shut
off
the lube oil.
Wow...prelubing. That thing never runs at all without oil. No wonder
the ones 70 years old are still pumping! Thanks for the procedure.
Very interesting. Your new diesel will be simple. Flip the switch,
Crank the starter and wait while the bare metal scrapes against each
other until the oil pressure rises 10 seconds later. Sounds
"temporary" doesn't it? No wonder the overhaul shop is packed...(c;
Now, this is a wonderful sequence, particularly the Motormatic (in this
age
of computer everything), but can you imagine trying to sell it as a yacht
over here in fifteen years?
I'm amazed at the automation. I have visions of a 16mm training film
for Lister engineers showing this neatly dressed narrator in his 1934
double-breasted suit pointing out how "Motormatic takes the work out
of starting it."
I can see you'd have to find a diehard diesel kinda guy to buy
it...It's a "manly thing"....
It has a number of little open catch basins for fuel that leaks off.
It's
hard mounted to huge engine beds, so the whole boat vibrates when it's
running -- four huge pistons, and while you can practically count the
strokes, they're very present. The official RN manual says that you
shouldn't run the boat between 7.5 and 10 knots, only faster or slower
(top
is 10.3), because of various resonances. Parts are beginning to be a
problem
(new starter $4,000).
I have a ham radio friend who is master of SeaLand "Performance", a
Dutch-made 950' containership. Performance has a very interesting
diesel power plant, 7 cylinders, 38,800HP at 110 RPM, 2-stroke, forced
air loop charging. She's about 3 decks high. The cylinders are about
5' in diameter with a 12' stroke. I couldn't pick up the spare
injector..(c; She's totally computer controlled! The duty engineer
has no need of being in the engine room. The computer will page him
on his pocket pager if it detects something it doesn't like. Each
injection is computer controlled for best combustion at this throttle
setting in each cylinder. It has no transmission or reduction gear.
The output shaft, which goes over the main generator room's massive
power plants to run all the refridgeration containers on deck, goes
directly to the single screw. A picture of the screw in drydock shows
his wife standing at the base of a blade that's about three times as
tall as she is. The screw is huge!
On the engineer's board in the air conditioned control room with
windows overlooking the engine gallery, there is a warning sign "DO
NOT OPERATE BETWEEN 32 AND 38 RPM". This is the resonant frequency of
the ship and engine. They run up through here very rapidly and never
operate from 30 to 40 RPM because the engine pulses will rip the hull
apart when the whole thing resonates with the engine going one way and
the hull the other.
Starting is simple. Push the throttle ahead to the position you like.
6000 PSI of compressed air is injected into the proper cylinder just
past TDC and #2 diesel fuel sprays into the pressure. The ensuing
explosion cranks it as the computer watches on. The compressed air
injection stops as the cylinders start firing on their own from just
the compression. The computer automatically turns on all the blowers,
etc., by itself. Once the engine exhaust comes up to BOIL the bunker
oil (one grade above Bunker 'C'), the computer switches the injection
over from the expensive #2 home heating oil to the boiling bunker oil
that was too thick to inject a little while ago. Now she settles in
and at econocruise only burns 75 tons of bunker oil a day to get to
Europe.
To reverse, pull the throttle back into reverse and the computer goes
back to air injection to blast the engine into reverse. Of course,
the 2-stroker will run equally well in both directions. Larry says he
can do an emergency stop from econocruise in....well....a while.
Takes a lot of power to stop all that mass in those boxes...
She'll come about in about 2 and a half miles! How's that for a high
speed turn?
He's been a master for many years. "You never get tired of playing
with it.", he tells me. It was a most impressive tour. I'd love to
see it running some day. He says the thumping is quite loud in there,
something like a diesel pile driver running.
And, as also shown graphically on the site, it's huge (see
http://www.mvfintry.com/pix/erplan800.png) -- the Cat 3406 is no little
thing, but look at the difference. While the engine room is 20 feet
square,
I've got a lot to go in it and removing the Lister helps.
Sorta makes you wonder what Cat left out.....metal?
And so forth. I'm sad, though. I'll miss it, except when trying to
sleep.
I'll bet if its thumping varies, you wake right up, too.....
Thanks for the information and your thoughts/story. Great website.
Larry W4CSC
"Very funny, Scotty! Now, BEAM ME MY CLOTHES! KIRK OUT!"