Sovereign Frank
New member
Hi, I have the above engine (1992) in my Van de Stadt Legend 29. It drives a Flexofold propelle via a Hurth Gearbox and Halyard Aquadrive.
The past couple of years it has given some problems. The most major was 2 years ago: complete loss of engine exiting the River Medina at Cowes - but that stoppage was soon tracked down to a lot of debris in the fuel tank. The tank was professionally removed, cleaned out and refitted at some expense - all the flexible pipes being subsequently replaced together with a new lift-pump.
The ongoing "problem" throughout this period has been the mysterious variation of the "tone" of the engine - the engine will be running smoothly and suddenly the engine note will either drop or sometimes increase (as if the throttle has been suddenly opened). The changes in tone last a few sends and then return to mormal. There is absolutely no difference notable in the amount of thrust being delivered in either case - not does the rev counter move a millimetre. Our local engineer wondered if there was not a constant enough pressure - so this winter an electric diesel pump was fitted; I thought this had done the trick but today the uneven engine notes returned!
One friend who has done a lot of work on buses says not to worry - it may be due to change of load (from variations of wind / waves / currents) to which the engine is normally responding. Another suggests it might be worth having the injectors serviced ( I don't think that has ever been done and the engine is 32 years old.)
I may be worrying unnecesarily - but I am not good on the mechanical side of things and the breakdown at the entrance to Cowes was quite a fright! There was hardly any wind blowing either!
Any ideas welcomed!
The past couple of years it has given some problems. The most major was 2 years ago: complete loss of engine exiting the River Medina at Cowes - but that stoppage was soon tracked down to a lot of debris in the fuel tank. The tank was professionally removed, cleaned out and refitted at some expense - all the flexible pipes being subsequently replaced together with a new lift-pump.
The ongoing "problem" throughout this period has been the mysterious variation of the "tone" of the engine - the engine will be running smoothly and suddenly the engine note will either drop or sometimes increase (as if the throttle has been suddenly opened). The changes in tone last a few sends and then return to mormal. There is absolutely no difference notable in the amount of thrust being delivered in either case - not does the rev counter move a millimetre. Our local engineer wondered if there was not a constant enough pressure - so this winter an electric diesel pump was fitted; I thought this had done the trick but today the uneven engine notes returned!
One friend who has done a lot of work on buses says not to worry - it may be due to change of load (from variations of wind / waves / currents) to which the engine is normally responding. Another suggests it might be worth having the injectors serviced ( I don't think that has ever been done and the engine is 32 years old.)
I may be worrying unnecesarily - but I am not good on the mechanical side of things and the breakdown at the entrance to Cowes was quite a fright! There was hardly any wind blowing either!
Any ideas welcomed!
