Engine checks under way

No Mast said:

Would it have been that difficult to route the polisher and engine feeds on the top L and R? That could have left the port feeds on the middle and lower left and the stb feeds on the middle and lower right, of course with the lower tanks on the bottom. Ok OCD satisfied.

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I've no problem with it. Learned to triple-check the fuel routing after having fuel beginning to leak onto the deck.

"Plus I use my ears. I know what my boat sounds like, and anything amis is quickly noticed."

My ears have helped me to detect problems, even from the flybridge. My frequency of ER checks is determined by the history of problems showing up in previous ER checks. Generally, where I go, passages are of 2 to 5 hrs in length. Waves are 0 to 2 ft (or we wait till they are), conditions are good. Help is never far away. Previous ER checks have proven that it is rare that the next check will turn up a surprise.
I doubt I am any different than most of the TF readers. Just different from most who have posted here.

In over 40 yrs of boating, an ER check has saved me from catastrophe, but only once, and the rest of the time, other things have saved me. My ears, my instruments, my before start checks. Those are far more important.
In that one event, I don't know if the ER check was the only thing that saved me. My regular, every few minute instrument check would likely have saved me, but an ER check intervened. That event was an ER fire. By opening the floor hatch to the ER, providing oxygen to the fire, the situation was identified and I was able to deal with it. Maybe, had the floor hatch not been lifted, the fire would have not had enough oxygen to amount to anything before instruments would have alerted me to the problem, and the ER check rendered irrelevant. How would you know?

I haven't given up ER checks, nor have I gone anal over them.

We are very sensitive to sound as well. However, there are limitations. Take a boat where the engines create 75 to 80 decibels of sound at the helm, then you'll certainly notice a change in them, but the quiet generator won't be heard over it. Now on the other end, if the sound from the engines is only 54 decibels at the helm, then will you hear them well enough.

I don't know the answers to either. However, I think using multiple tools is beneficial. That includes some amount of instrumentation, some amount of listening, and some amount of checks. Those all vary person to person and boat to boat and based on cruising patterns.

When we do an hour and fifteen minute run to Miami Beach we just check before the run. However, when we do a 60 hour run off shore in 4-6' or more, we feel regular checks of the engine room are important. Note, I said "engine room" not "engines." We're really checking everything there.

Those are extremes of usage that require very different levels of care.

I do hourly ER checks, including IR temps. It takes about 2 minutes. And gauge readings are recorded each half hour on the ships bell by whoever is on the helm.

On one of these ER checks I found a cracked house alternator bracket, noticed because of excess vibration. I was able to secure the system with hose clamps and transited about 3hr to a repair place in Shearwater, BC. Left unattended, the alternator would likely have broken off completely and there would have been substantial damage. So I know the bracket was broken for <1hr.

The IR checks on heat exchanger, transmission and oil cooler give me a good baseline. I know what the temperature differential is on the inlet and outlet side of the heat exchanged so have a measure on its performance. I am pretty sure that a broken vane in the exchanger would show up in the temperature differential.

So I will likely keep on doing what I am dong.

An exhaust temperature monitor/alarm is on my list.

As some people suggested, engine checks 10 -15 after startup are critical. Everything is up to full temperature/pressure and an early check a problem before it turns into a disaster. I've found that the first 15 minutes is the most likely time for problems.

Early checks saved my butt a while ago, when I lifted the hatch to find sea water half way up the engine block. The exhaust hose had slipped off the muffler, and the bilge pump switch had failed. A bad combination! Another minute or two and the engine would have been sucking in water.

For those who do hourly ER checks and run your generator 24/7 if no shore power:
Do you still do hourly ER checks all night when not under way (at anchor or a dock without power)? Isn't the risk of fire from a broken injector line still there?

Ted

AusCan said:

Early checks saved my butt a while ago, when I lifted the hatch to find sea water half way up the engine block. The exhaust hose had slipped off the muffler, and the bilge pump switch had failed. A bad combination! Another minute or two and the engine would have been sucking in water.

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Only one bilge pump?
If you don't have it, add a light and buzzer on back up pump, at the helm to alert you to the pump running.

Ted

Our boat is a converted launch , so to examine the iron , one must roll off a rug , move sound damping and lift a hatch.

This is done at the completion of a days cruise.The DD is painted white so an oil leak would stand out. The dip stick is checked to make sure the engine is not "making" oil.

The alt belt and the PS belts are looked at , thats it.

Should some exciting thing happen in the dark air , I am sure all is well in the ER and the engine can be started instantly.

Low oil and coolant overheat are on a loud alarm buzzer , so if my engine scan breaks down while cruising , I get a warning.

With over 1,600 hours of cruising so far , and no problems , this works for me.

O C Diver said:

For those who do hourly ER checks and run your generator 24/7 if no shore power:
Do you still do hourly ER checks all night when not under way (at anchor or a dock without power)? Isn't the risk of fire from a broken injector line still there?

Ted

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Ah, Ted's really thinking now. Ok, first, we don't do hourly checks, every other hour. Second, we do that when cruising.

Then to the question, we don't check the generator every two hours during the night. We do have alarms for water, fire, temperature, and everything else we can think of. We differentiate this versus running off shore in that the risk of being left stranded is less. However, we still recognize the risk of flooding or fire and the point is valid, that we might catch something slightly slower at night. Hopefully we've protected ourselves reasonably with alarms. We've made a judgement that we have. Fires from broken injector lines on generators that wouldn't set off alarms in time are something we've determined to be an acceptable risk. We check the ER before going to bed and upon waking.

O C Diver said:

Only one bilge pump?
If you don't have it, add a light and buzzer on back up pump, at the helm to alert you to the pump running.

Ted

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It's been on the "list" for a while now. I've been a bit slack. It's now made it to the top of the page.

We very seldom had to run the generator all night. I did check it maybe twice if we did, as I liked to get up when the current clocked anyway, and the occasional visit to the head and look at the stars. It was very easy to do on the Hatt, just a lift of a hatch in the galley and it could all be done from there in 30 seconds. I think it would be quite noticeable noise wise if an injector line leaked, let alone if the genset would even run.

BandB said:

Then to the question, we don't check the generator every two hours during the night. We do have alarms for water, fire, temperature, and everything else we can think of. ... We check the ER before going to bed and upon waking.

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I've been thinking about this thread while doing my diesel clean-up from the genset problem. Luckily it didn't happen underway, luckily it didn't flood the engine room enough to start pumping diesel overboard...

(This wasn't like a normal slow leak from a loose fuel hose; more like what would happen if the metal receptacle -- that holds a spin-on filter -- cracked. That description is technically inaccurate; it didn't crack, but one of the ports, a metal piece that I had thought was an integral part of the casting, almost ejected itself.)

If I had been doing hourly checks... that would not have been often enough; bilge pumps would have activated, diesel overboard, downhill very fast from there. We too seldom do frequent checks on the generator when we're just hanging around at anchor, and we seldom run it overnight anyway. (In this case, it was just Spring start-up, normal systems check, at the dock...)

The bilge pump warnings might have gotten my attention -- had I been on the bridge -- but by then it'd be too late for that overboard thing. The high water alarm would certainly have gotten my attention -- again, too late.

A camera (or cameras) in the engine room... maybe, although I'd have had to keep my eyes glued to the display to notice this particular incident early enough. And it (or they) would have had to be aimed at just the right place. And the display would have to be near where I was; display on the bridge, with me doing some other chore in the saloon... no good.

Maybe another high water alarm, mounted lower. Or I could maybe remount the existing sensor, low enough to give an earlier warning... but that still could have allowed a boatload of diesel in the bilge...

I'm still trying to analyze my way toward a better solution...

-Chris