How Old is Your Engine?

[Latestarter1]

???
By comparison many old mechanical fuel pumps CAV DPA with hydraulic governing are no longer viable to repair.
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Tell me about it! I have a good 'un and one that is suspect, but >£500 quoted to look at it and recalibrate if that's all it takes. Can, maybe, get a mechanical equivalent for less than that, but doubt its a viable replacement part on a drop in basis!

But there is also no (as far as I am aware) alternative and engine replacement is uneconomic. Despite the undoubted advantages of modern electronics there is no backwards compatibility, quite understandablly so, and therefore those with older engines will keep them soldiering on as best they can, happy in the knowledge that most trouble can be solved, or at least alleviated, with a spanner and a bit of knowledge.

In passing, why does it not seem possible to have the engine diagnostics feed to a screen that translates codes to language of choice and allows some form of user override? Limp home is OK for some situations, but mid Channel with a faulty sensor and the weather turning sounds like a lifeboat call when an "Ignore" button might have some equal validity, unless in warranty ofc

I spend far too much time looking at motors which are way past their sell by date, too much time tinkering. Spoilt weekends and ruined holidays.

Somebody recently spent over 1K on the Lancing Marine smoke elimination kit for a a pair of very tired old Ford Dorsets, kits were worth any more than the engines they were fitted to.......... Leaky smokey old engines are often a complete money pit, not to mention the aggo and time associated tracking down obsolete and expensive parts.

I learned more than a few lessons from a friend who operated trucks in Africa (Zimbabwe/Zambia), he said I don't I even consider your old mechanical third world junk, I find trucks with electronic engines more reliable and durable. Pal operated over one hundred and fifty tractor trailer combinations with a mix of Cummins N14, Detroit Series 60 and some Volvo D12's, he made the switch to full authority electronic engines back in the late 90's.

Scenario with failed sensors etc does not paint a true picture. Remember when the RNLI are called out if it is a modern boat it will have electronic engine.

 

[marina95]

1977 Sabb 10hp single cylinder diesel. No idea hopw many hours, lots I suspect! very reliable and easy to handstart if necessary.

1969 Sabb 10hb single cylinder diesel No idea how many hours, very reliable but when very cold requires a cigarette before chugging into action. In summer, easily hand-startable but requires a squirt of oil in the nipple on top of the cylinder head!

 

[ulyden]

I spend far too much time looking at motors which are way past their sell by date, too much time tinkering. Spoilt weekends and ruined holidays.

Somebody recently spent over 1K on the Lancing Marine smoke elimination kit for a a pair of very tired old Ford Dorsets, kits were worth any more than the engines they were fitted to.......... Leaky smokey old engines are often a complete money pit, not to mention the aggo and time associated tracking down obsolete and expensive parts.

I learned more than a few lessons from a friend who operated trucks in Africa (Zimbabwe/Zambia), he said I don't I even consider your old mechanical third world junk, I find trucks with electronic engines more reliable and durable. Pal operated over one hundred and fifty tractor trailer combinations with a mix of Cummins N14, Detroit Series 60 and some Volvo D12's, he made the switch to full authority electronic engines back in the late 90's.

Scenario with failed sensors etc does not paint a true picture. Remember when the RNLI are called out if it is a modern boat it will have electronic engine.

Some comments:

Last sea trial I had on a pleasure boat was with a lancing marine puma 145hp mecanic engine. If you whant to improve reliebility and reduse smoke on this with elektronics you have to get early up in the monrning. (But i have to admit that increasing the power output from 145hp to 220hp eaven I had cosidered elektronic controll)

We have a lot of fork lifts at work. They claim the new engines failing more often than the old ones even if the old engines are 10-15 years older.

Anyway i'm getting a bad fealing that the emissions agument are weak and that new elektronics engine have tekniologi that is total overkill to meet current emission level for pleasure marine engines. Please tell me i'm wrong!

 

[stuhaynes]

The big problem with electronic control is that in an emergency not even the fairies can see what's wrong..... The older engines win every time IMHO when it comes to dropping an anchor and sorting things out. Is anyone going to take the challenge and tell me I'm wrong? Go on, I dare you

 

[Assassin]

Andrew:

It is nothing to do with the manufacturers, it is the politicians and the politicians alone who set the legislation, and the engine manufacturers have to comply with the legislation, its that simple.

Have you heard all the discord about the next round of environmental legislation currently proposed? many engine manufacturers are up in arms about it as many are struggling to comply with the proposed legislation. Many others are asking for delays to the legislation as they cannot develop engines within the timeframe for the proposed legislation.

Stu:

You are wrong!!! now i have said it and i dare.

The problem with any engines can be many things, electrical/electronic or mechanical, so before anyone makes wild assumptions lets look at the facts. Suppose you get a timing chain snap, drop a valve, or your mechanical injection pump develops a serious fault, could you repair them at sea? no is the answer, so as i say it depends on the fault.
Electronic systems are inherently reliable, and most systems have a function with many names, usually limp home mode is the most popular term. This works very simply by substituting the variable value of a sensor with a fixed value, the engine may be more difficult to start from cold but it will start, it may run rough when cold, but it will run. The default values are set at the average at full running temperature, and explains why you would hardly tell the difference at operating temperature, but you will with a cold or warming engine.

Ulyden:

You are wrong, read the above and you will see why.

 

[Assassin]

As an aside to the above, a couple of engine manufacturers are now fitting diagnostic identification systems to their engines to allow users to identify a fault rather then an (alleged) technician with a scanner. Detroit Diesel are one such manufacturer, they offer this option on their truck and a small number of their industrial engines, these operate as either a number of LED;s or by flashing the engine management warning light in trucks in a prescribed manner.

With the LED system you have a row of green LED's and a row of red LED;s, the green LED's signify 10 and the red LED's signify 1.
If you have a fault and have 3 green LED's and 7 red LED's it means fault code 37, you simply look up fault code 37 in the user manual and you have your problem.

With the flashing engine management version it flashes long flashes for 10, and short flashes for single units; so if you get three long flashes and seven short flashes you have fault code 37.

 

[Latestarter1]

As an aside to the above, a couple of engine manufacturers are now fitting diagnostic identification systems to their engines to allow users to identify a fault rather then an (alleged) technician with a scanner. Detroit Diesel are one such manufacturer, they offer this option on their truck and a small number of their industrial engines, these operate as either a number of LED;s or by flashing the engine management warning light in trucks in a prescribed manner.

With the LED system you have a row of green LED's and a row of red LED;s, the green LED's signify 10 and the red LED's signify 1.
If you have a fault and have 3 green LED's and 7 red LED's it means fault code 37, you simply look up fault code 37 in the user manual and you have your problem.

With the flashing engine management version it flashes long flashes for 10, and short flashes for single units; so if you get three long flashes and seven short flashes you have fault code 37.

We have always had this facility regardless of engine make and still do as far as I know.

In Africa if a problem occured in a truck many hundreds of miles away driver called in to the office and repeated the blink code, as a result tec collected the correct parts, slung his bag of tools in the Cessna and flew out to fix the problem. This was over ten years ago, they now have facility if truck satellite tracked with destination automatically informed by the truck systems of potential problem to ensure parts are available to ensure turnaround without delay. This is in a market where they are so short of $$ that diesel is cut with up to 30% kero to save costs.

When I see the state of repair shops here and skill levels, sometimes wonder which is the the Third World Country!

 

[LittleShip]

When I see the state of repair shops here and skill levels, sometimes wonder which is the the Third World Country!

I dont always agree with what you say but...... I fully agree with this one. Some of the "Marine Engineers" I have seen the work of, shouldnt be allowed to wipe an oily rag on a pushbike.

Tom

 

[ian38_39]

Comparisons between commercial vehicles and pleasure boats just do not stand up.

A lorry will give you your generator status, almost constant running in the protected dry environment of a lorry engine bay.

A pleasure boat stands most of it's life in a salt water humid atmospheric surrounding.

Am I talking a load of rubbish when I say there are more sensor failures than their are real faults and given that there are generally no or very few moving parts within these sensors they are more likely to fail with age and conditions they they ever are to wear out?

The problem mainly lies with the overriding power that these sensors have, if the sensor is faulty then by default anything controlled by it becomes faulty too. on more than one occasion I have been party to a sensor causing a perfectly good part to destroy itself.

The other issue is one of cost when a sensor that costs penny's to produce and minutes to change becomes a bill for hundreds of pounds to reset or replace.

 

[Andrew_Fanner]

The problem mainly lies with the overriding power that these sensors have, if the sensor is faulty then by default anything controlled by it becomes faulty too. on more than one occasion I have been party to a sensor causing a perfectly good part to destroy itself..

I think this is very much the crux of the matter. If the CO sensor signals excessive CO levels the engine might go into limp mode to minimise fuel burn and thus CO emitted. In a truck on North Circular that's a viable outcome. In a boat mid Channel you may want the option of bypassing the sensor signal and retaining full power. Obviously if the CO is too high because of a genuine mechanical failure bypassing wont do you much good, but you may have spotted the reason already, grinding sounds, clouds of smoke and steam or what have you

Conversely, if things are out of kilter, I would be more than happy for a decent engine monitoring system to tell me what was wrong, and in what manner. And yes, that would include inlet/outlet temperatures, COx/NOx/SOx monitoring, mass flow, the whole shebang. That's all useful data. Flashing lights and a paper manual are not really compatible with that when a little LCD readout with plain language descriptions would be so simple and then only a step away from a recommended actions screen, eg:
Exhaust temperature high, recommend check raw water flow
(although any decent monitoring system would detect volume flow rate of raw water and advise if it went out of parameters)

I am thoroughly in favour of the concept of engine monitoring and management systems but find that the actual application can be questionable

 

[Latestarter1]

Comparisons between commercial vehicles and pleasure boats just do not stand up.

A lorry will give you your generator status, almost constant running in the protected dry environment of a lorry engine bay.

A pleasure boat stands most of it's life in a salt water humid atmospheric surrounding.

Am I talking a load of rubbish when I say there are more sensor failures than their are real faults and given that there are generally no or very few moving parts within these sensors they are more likely to fail with age and conditions they they ever are to wear out?

The problem mainly lies with the overriding power that these sensors have, if the sensor is faulty then by default anything controlled by it becomes faulty too. on more than one occasion I have been party to a sensor causing a perfectly good part to destroy itself.

The other issue is one of cost when a sensor that costs penny's to produce and minutes to change becomes a bill for hundreds of pounds to reset or replace.

In real life faulty sensors are an incredibly rare occurence, why do people get so hung up about all this. When I come across boaters talking about this stuff a bit of probing reaveals half assed fuel filteration systems and zero understanding about the very real dangers of not staying on top of SWAC servicing, both these issues will bring them grief long before they are disabled with sensor issues.

Yard I do some work for in California has done over 200 re-powers with electronic engines from Cat/Cummins/Detroit in both pleasure and commercial applications, many installations on high hours. This yard tracks 90% his customers, reported failures due to sensor issues over ten year period, possibly one, and even that may have been down to poor diagnosis.

There ARE issues with the ill trained numpties who fit engines to new vessels. Last year I was asked to sort out why a pair of engines were were showing completely different boost and oil pressures. Turned out one engine was retaining boost and lube pressure in its memory then adding it to the live data on start up this giving whacky reading. Took hours to solve, however eventually came down to the brainless tec who installed the engines had NOT read the installation manual, case of RTFM! Manual stated that engines required to be wired always hot, tec did it his usual way through master switch!

How come I can get a Cummins B, Perkins Phaser or Volvo 60 Series rebuilt in Africa, Australia or South America with TOTAL confidence that it is done by the book in a spotless workshop, here I shudder. Take a look at the state of the work shop at Coastal Rides before even considering an engine re-built by them, and they are not alone. General workshop standards here are truly shocking.

Electronic motors will not fire up unless it can 'see' lube pressure and will not give you throttle control until start up conditions are correct. The throttle jockey who cranks his motors with wide open throttle is totally defeated, just one major durability bonus.

Yes you can make comparisons across all applications, marine engines operate in comfy dust free, steam cleaner free, lightly loaded, pretty constant ambient and certainly constant altitude, a truly cosseted envioroment. Never heard anybody hung up about sensor reliability before stepping on an flight, we all work to the same standards of redundantcy and reliability.

 

[Latestarter1]

Name often comes up here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVZD2MJdusw

Dirty filthy untidy pig hole!

Sadly too typical of standards here.

 

[ulyden]

Well latestarter you should have seen my sister's 2005 mondeo. Smoking black and making a awful sound. Two different work shops (Ford dealer and a BOSCH shop can't find any error). But it runs so i guess its ok.

I register that you beleave mounting at common rail and ecu on a 50hp perkins diesel will improve reliability

Lets hope the engine elektronics is better than equipment that are measuring their emissions. Just one of tre chemiluminescence nox analysers is still working at work, and i have 3 engines that needs IMO Tier 2 sertifikates this week.

By the way. My colleague have a 2000 opel trouble with engine osilating. After dealer chaged trotle boddy no difference. ECU have to go to GB for trouble shooting and repair. Another colleague had a similar work on his vektra. No car for 1 month ecu were failing. The cost of repair was not big but he had been using weeks on trouble shooting sensors before he decided to send the ecu away. Both this failures happend within a year. Fatal on sea in bad wether.

Was reading thru a volvo penta manual yesterday. 123 pages going thru all error codes. Lots of them had change ecu as repair. People are complaining about paying 5000£ for a new ecu on a 10 000hp engine. I fully understand them complaining about 2000£ on a 200hp engine. Spesially when the engine is used only 50h a year. 5% fuel savings don't defend that.

Where i live the rescue boats mainly have mekanical engines. If they are elektronic they have two engines. This is because thees wessels needs classification. The rule are that no fault should reduse power more than that the engine can remain at 50% speed. You need a double common rail system to achieve that.

 

[ian38_39]

Hate to go down this line as it is again comparing auto with Marine but my 2006 2.2 tdi Mondeo is in the garage again tomorrow.

Has so far in 75000 miles ate 3 maf sensors (I think that is what they called them), one crankcase sensor and is running like a pig, as it has been for most of its life. At present it is misfiring like hell and sitting in clouds of white smoke.

My previous 2000 2L petrol Mondeo did 186000 miles without missing a beat. still had sensors but maybe it just means petrol's are the more reliable option?

If main dealers can't fix them maybe things have gone too far?

 

[No Regrets]

1978 Perkins 4-108, reconditioned after thirty years, and currently as sweet as a nut. (Broom 30, single engine)

Requires very little servicing other than filters, virtually no smoke unless WOT, and does around 5mpg at 7mph, or around 0.75 gph on the upper Thames.

Can't really hear it up on the flybridge, but a bit thrummy downstairs.

Starts easily, and would cost under £2000 to replace with a cheap recon Taxi unit, using existing marinised bits...

Luvvly Jubbly!

Also fitted with a Wing engine, 11hp Nanni, probably a worthy little thing, gets up to mph eventually, and no smoke. Doubt it will last as long though!

 

[Andrew_Fanner]

Name often comes up here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VVZD2MJdusw

Dirty filthy untidy pig hole!

Sadly too typical of standards here.

This one

http://youtu.be/uvXnktE4QDU

looks like my old boat, and guess who did the engine...

 

[Latestarter1]

Well latestarter you should have seen my sister's 2005 mondeo. Smoking black and making a awful sound. Two different work shops (Ford dealer and a BOSCH shop can't find any error). But it runs so i guess its ok.

I register that you beleave mounting at common rail and ecu on a 50hp perkins diesel will improve reliability

Lets hope the engine elektronics is better than equipment that are measuring their emissions. Just one of tre chemiluminescence nox analysers is still working at work, and i have 3 engines that needs IMO Tier 2 sertifikates this week.

By the way. My colleague have a 2000 opel trouble with engine osilating. After dealer chaged trotle boddy no difference. ECU have to go to GB for trouble shooting and repair. Another colleague had a similar work on his vektra. No car for 1 month ecu were failing. The cost of repair was not big but he had been using weeks on trouble shooting sensors before he decided to send the ecu away. Both this failures happend within a year. Fatal on sea in bad wether.

Was reading thru a volvo penta manual yesterday. 123 pages going thru all error codes. Lots of them had change ecu as repair. People are complaining about paying 5000£ for a new ecu on a 10 000hp engine. I fully understand them complaining about 2000£ on a 200hp engine. Spesially when the engine is used only 50h a year. 5% fuel savings don't defend that.

Where i live the rescue boats mainly have mekanical engines. If they are elektronic they have two engines. This is because thees wessels needs classification. The rule are that no fault should reduse power more than that the engine can remain at 50% speed. You need a double common rail system to achieve that.

New RNLI Shannon Class lifeboats under development....CAT C9's, many problems encountered during the long and intensive development phase of this vessel, engine issues, NONE! Two engines required regardless of being mechanical or electronic, classification societies do not differentiate, SOLAS have some batty outdated rules which are being re-drawn, twin engines in a rescue vessel just plain common sense...

I have made my view clear before that the use of of LDA (Light Duty Automove) engines operating a levels far cleaner than off road limits have no place in marine applications. Once again problems facing repairers of LDA diesel engines is:

#1 Our colleges turning out young people with inadequate skill levels, for years now they have been paid grants based on the numbers turned out, not the quality. Inability to understand the most basic mathematics is commonplace. The few good people become overloaded, whilst the numpties change filters and lubes.
#2 Major manufacturers have reduced the SRT (Standard Repair Times) to a level which makes the job of the workshop co-ordinator a complete nightmare.
#3 Take MAF sensors which do not/should not figure on marine engines, failure is in 99% cases caused by overfilling with lube oil, caused by the numpties in note #1 or stupid owners, another case of RTFM! High lube oil level causes oil carryover which in turn coats the MAF sensor reducing it's sensitivity.
#4 Fear of electronics due to ill educated and trained technicians (They are not engineers) means that they often start out on the wrong path. Typical example is low power complaint with hours spent trying to diagnose the problem with electronic diagnostic tools, as soon a a clear thinking tec went back to basics, ignored the electronic tools and put the gauges on, RTFM Simple restriction in fuel line due to disposable plastic glove ending up in the fuel tank, pieces eventually found their way into the fuel line.

Becoming paranoid by reading manufacturers fault code listing and making any judgement based on fault codes requiring replacement of ECM/ECU is plain nonsense. I currently have 18 new Volvo D12 ECU's which came along with a large batch of new old staock engine parts. Contacted Volvo dealer who checked useage, annually they sell a MAXIMUM of two into a truck market of many thousands.

Having warm cozy thoughts about a Perkins 4.108 is at best bizarre, when they were new they were always a poor substitute for a Mercedes OM636. As to being a taxi appication, yes they were approved retrofit to Fiat 124's for use in taxi conversions, never used in this country.

Sums up where this thread started, I can assure the poster that his modern Kubota based Nanni will still be running sweetly long after the 4.108 has cracked it's cylinder head for the n'th time. All based on a perception that old, crude and heavy is good, modern is bad. Not true.

 

[Andrew_Fanner]

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Sums up where this thread started, I can assure the poster that his modern Kubota based Nanni will still be running sweetly long after the 4.108 has cracked it's cylinder head for the n'th time. All based on a perception that old, crude and heavy is heavy is good, modern is bad. Not true.
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I think fairer to say the feeling is that old = fair chance of maintainence/repair/patchup when on passage by the experienced if untrained owner, new = maintainence/repair only by trained technician and you have made a very convincing case that many of those are of dubious worth.

If some kind soul wants to replace my 6354s with a couple of nice modern engines without my having to find more than the value of the boat (or indeed anything at all, been an expensive year so far) for the process I'm up for it

 

[moonraker 36]

>>>
Sums up where this thread started, I can assure the poster that his modern Kubota based Nanni will still be running sweetly long after the 4.108 has cracked it's cylinder head for the n'th time. All based on a perception that old, crude and heavy is heavy is good, modern is bad. Not true.
>>>
I think fairer to say the feeling is that old = fair chance of maintainence/repair/patchup when on passage by the experienced if untrained owner, new = maintainence/repair only by trained technician and you have made a very convincing case that many of those are of dubious worth.

If some kind soul wants to replace my 6354s with a couple of nice modern engines without my having to find more than the value of the boat (or indeed anything at all, been an expensive year so far) for the process I'm up for it

don't be stupid 6354's RULE...

 

[No Regrets]

There's usually a reason for engines cracking heads.

In a boat, very few engines actually wear out or fail, they simply go wrong because of poor maintenance or cooling issues!

Apparently, the original engine did 30 years with no issues, on Loch Ness and the Norfolk Broads. It was overhauled because it was a bit old and smoky!

I'll bet it wasn't designed to last that long, nor are any of the small boat engines made nowadays!