Bore glazing again

[Heckler]

early on in the year i had the temerity to suggest that there was nothing wrong in running the engine to charge the batteries, wow what a maelstrom that caused, well gues what, ST today in the Jan issue Duncan Kent in an article about charging says "the best electrical genny on board any sailing boat under 50 ft is-you guessed it- your engine" he went on to say about that the old chestnut about not running a diesel unloaded "well i beg to differ- most diesels in long term sailing boats suffer from lack of use, which in turn takes years off its life" "if you cycle the electrical system there will be plenty of load on the bulk of the charging phase"
i am continuing to run my engine every weekend at 1500 revs as i have done since last year and no problem, the engine gets nice and warm and burns off any condensation in the interior, the calorifier heats my domestic and my batteries are nicely charged.
nice aint it when an expert who makes a living from giving advice confirms ones knowledge is correct!
stu
ps the engine is still in tip top condition

<hr width=100% size=1>http://www.beneteau-owners-association.org.uk

 

[MainlySteam]

I do the same thing.

Also, in the worst case, if generating electricity with the main engine on non-super sized boats does turn out to be bad for the engine, then you can do an awful lot of maintenance on the engine and still come out way better than the cost of a properly installed dedicated generator and its maintenance.

John

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[StugeronSteve]

Thought you had been getting those calls from the window call centres again!

Read an article in one of the mags a few months ago (think it was by someone from Volvo, but I may be wrong). The article suggested that you should not waste money over specifying a diesel engine for a sailing boat, as it was essential for longevity that the engine be used under load and not left ticking over. Might make the engine last longer but how it would cope with the Alderney Race or similar is another question.

I must say from my very limited knowledge of industrial engines that they do seem to benefit from a bit of work though.

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[Robin]

Stand by for incoming

The ST article does say add a second high power alternator and smart regulator(s) in addition to the standard alternator. This will put some sort of load on the engine, quite a few horsepower in fact to power say 2 alternators totalling 150A - 200A. If you are running at 1500rpm with a standard machine sensed regulator and standard alternator, you will charge quite well for all of maybe 20 minutes after which the regulator will pull the charge down very quickly to quite a low level - it thinks you have a car and will be driving all day. With luck if you run all day, you might get the batteries to 75% full. Assuming you know better than to discharge them more than 50%, you now have an effective AH rating available from your battery of 25% of the total, ie you can use just 25AH of your 100AH battery, not a very good deal in exchange for glazing the bores is it?

If you must run the engine for charging, at least do it in gear in your berth or in reverse on your mooring. You WILL get glazed bores otherwise, eventually you will have high oil consumption and low compression/poor starting. All IMHO of course.





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[halcyon]

Re: Stand by for incoming

The alternator regulator only controls voltage, the current drops due to the internal battery increasing, but the voltage remains constant, thus current drops.
The charge level depends on the regulator setting, normally now around 14.6 volt, above this level the voltage required rises sharply, giving a lot of gassing for little gain in charge level.
Biggest problem are blocking diodes and machine sensed alternators, which can drop 1 volt with ease, and drop recharge levels down to 50% if your lucky.

Brian

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[TheBoatman]

For what its worth, one of our club boats has a Volvo MD22 in it. Earlier this year a couple of members managed to turn the ignition off, remove the key and go ashore, this was at 3 o/c on a Sunday afternoon.
Next morning at 8 o/c the bosun arrived for work and wondered why there was blue smoke coming out of the exhaust, and who would be using it at that time of the morning.
YES youv'e guessed it the members had managed to leave the engine ticking over with the ignition switched off for 17hrs.

A quick zip down the river at near full throttle and there doesn't seem to be any damage done, which surprised the hell out of me, I was thinking at least knackered alternator and glazed bores, NO nuffin'

Now all I have to do is get them to turn the engine sea cock on so that they don't keep blowing up pump impellors at 25 quid a go and I've cracked it.

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[ParaHandy]

.. both arguments (run 'em or glaze 'em) have some truth. the more likely danger is sulphur corrosion and you mitigate that by regular oil changes. twice a year would be wise and a filter once a year.

moderate, occasional, running of a diesel engine can not of itself do any harm and would be recommended for all the reasons you give; even better under load and most do so as far as i can tell. but do change the oil frequently.

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[ccscott49]

So we`ve been proved right, finally!

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[ccscott49]

Re: Stand by for incoming

Bore glazing! I dont think so, not with modern engines and modern oils, as long as the engine reaches working tempareature. IMHO. But if it make you feel better, run it in gear, shouldn`t do any harm.

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[Robin]

Re: Stand by for incoming

As you say, machine sensed alternators and blocking diodes will drop the volts at the battery significantly, but a standard alternator/regulator combination runs at 14.2v (not 14.6v) AT THE ALTERNATOR. By the time it reaches the battery it could be down to 13.2v, good luck getting many amps out at that unless the battery is very flat. Thanks to an incompetent (professional) installation on our boat we had two out of three battery banks being charged by a 90A std alternator through a split charge diode, the smart regulator though had been fitted to the 2nd alternator charging a single bank. The voltage at these two batteries was just 13.2v and they never really recharged, we actually achieved better at anchor with the wind genny and solar panels. Once the problem was identified we fitted a 2nd smart regulator and now we do have some proper charging going!

It amuses me to see engines being run at tickover or little more for charging at anchor. I suspect many of these have standard charging systems and without proper instruments to show the true situation the owners cannot see how little is being achieved in practice.

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[tcm]

yes, regular oil changes is a key thing. There was a thing in motorbike magazines a while back with people who changed oil on a new bike every 500 miles to start, then every 1000 miles (and engine oil seemed dead cheap then?...) were getting fantastic mpg figures : 20 % better than listed.

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[ccscott49]

Re: Stand by for incoming

The reasons you quote her, made me buy a sterling battery management panel, I now know the state of all my battery bankls, an excellent addition, I already have a smart regulator on my doemstic bank, charged from stb main and a normal reg on port, for the engine bank, which cannot be used for domestics, without pressing a solenoid, which allows the banks to be shorted together in an emergency, we also have a genny, with seperste bank and a mains three stage charger. Before crossing the pond, I will buy a wind genny, but wait until I get to the states for my solar panels, very cheap!!


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[chippie]

Re: Stand by for incoming

What price are they? can you give me an example please. They always seem expensive to me. It might be viable to get some by mail order.
Thanks.

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[Robin]

Re: Stand by for incoming

Colin I think we are looking at this from different perspectives. On a boat that is used primarily under sail the engine is used infrequently and for short periods, in and out of harbours perhaps or in flat calms. Maybe in the Med engines get worked more but where winds are steady and reliable they don't. Engine sizes in boats have gone up over the years and most are run (smoothly and quietly) at lower load/rpm than the smaller engines of old used to be. If you combine this low load running for short periods with running at anchor for recharging THEN there is the potential for glazing bores IMO. I'm not talking about occasional light load running but the long term use of such methods. There are cruiser racers in our marina for example who will run the engine in normal use just for 10 minutes to get out in and out of the marina, but run it much longer in the berths to charge batteries - why do this when they could just plug in a 220v charger?

Our previous Westerly 33 had a Mercedes OM636 42HP as standard and the previous owners had run it for years just for charging on the mooring. We inherited an engine which used as much oil as diesel and the engineer who rebuilt it pointed out the glazed bores to us. In addition once we had an ammeter/voltmeter fitted we could see just how little actual charge was getting to the batteries even under normal running let alone doing it at lower revs, the difference once we fitted a smart regulator was incredible!

Our current boat has a big wind genny (Aerogen 6), a fixed 75W solar panel, a 'roving' 110W solar panel and if 220v is available a 40A smart charger. The engine charging (now sorted) comprises a 90A alternator and a 70A alternator, both with Adverc smart regulators so IF we were to run the engine just to charge at least there would be some loading on it. In practice we have enough alternative power never to run just to charge, the need to seek a harbour for food/water stockup means we need the engine for a while at least even if we don't then have 220v available when we reach harbour.

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[ccscott49]

Re: Stand by for incoming

Just seen some on E bay, at 172pounds for 120watt panels. That is incredibly cheap, even mainstream panels in USA are pound for dollar or much cheaper. There are some now, with "slight blemishes" for sale outside US, I`m sure you could get a deal with a lower price marked on the paperwork, and call them secondhand! Have a look, when you search e bay, click on worldwide or whatever.

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[Robin]

Re: Stand by for incoming

I don't suppose there is any danger of glazed bores then! Seriously though it is not just the possible harm to the engine that bugs me it is also the noise, it is much nicer sitting in a nice QUIET anchorage than one where every other boat has the engine or generator running.

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[ccscott49]

Re: Stand by for incoming

Geenys these days with seperators can be virtually silent, but I get your point, trouble is even in the meddy, with all that sun, I would need about 240 watts of solar power to run the boat, with a bit of wind power aswell, do you know how much 240 watts of solar power panels costs in UK, Yes? then you see why I have a generator. Also I have a motorsailer, so I`m using an engine when cruising most of the time, so it`s not really a hassle for me to charge my batteries, 550 ah at 24 volts domestic, by the way and I can keep that lot going with two hour a day on my genny, or rather four hours every two days, which I can do in the late morning, so as to not disturb folks, when at anchor for a week or so. As I have said, I will buy solar, when I cross the pond, but not in europe, unless the price drops by 60%. Bore glazing? We run engines in the oilfield at tickover for days, then use them at high revs for a few hours then back to tickover, we dont have trouble with glazing. My case rests your honour!

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[brianhumber]

Re: No Load running and Sulphur

Unless you are running in very high ambient temps, a little bit of polishing on naturally aspirated engines will not materially affect the performance or starting of a small boat/yacht engine. You would need to run run these engnes for years before needing to deglaze/re-ring in NW Europe. I have easily started 15 year old lifeboat engines whilst we were frozen in the Baltic in -10, but the same engines were three times as difficult to start in the tropics due to the reduced compression caused by years of weekly running off load.
On changing oil, this again is a well worn topic. It does not matter if you are using red/white, marine gas, diesel or DERV, the amount of Sulphur in the fuel sold today in NW Europe will not reduce the base additive of a traditional mineral lube oil unless your engine runs the equilivant of 10,000 miles +in hours. For me this works out at 2/3 years in my yacht, and the engine is 16 years old with full oil pressure, combustion and injectors that were last serviced purely as a check 8 years ago.
A lot of time, money and resources are wasted every year because people belive crap peddled in magazines and books, written by people who reproduce what they learnt 30/40 years ago without bothering to update themselves in the subjects they write about.

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[ccscott49]

Re: No Load running and Sulphur

Well said that man!

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[Robin]

So you agree then

That weekly running of engines at no load causes difficulties in starting, especially in the tropics. That is exactly the scenario/location when charging is required and DAILY running at no load is likely!

Not doubting what you say but doesn't the warmer air make starting easier than cold air? I have heated up air filters or intakes in the past to get a worn engine going.

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