Marine Diesel Engines in Yachts Things you need to know. (Something for free). Part 2
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Closed Captions (CC):
hi there
hi folks well in part two of this video
um we're going to look at diagnosing
engine problems
um and the time when you're most likely
to be able to diagnose a problem or know
you have a problem
is when you start your engine so what
we've done is we've put together
a engine pre-start list
and we've given some explanations of why
we do those checks
so as part of this video we're now going
to show you how we do these checks
and what we're looking for and why we're
looking for it
so what's the first item cindy check the
oil level on the dipstick
it should be between the upper and lower
limits beware of high oil levels this
can indicate water in the oil or fuel
[Applause]
[Music]
[Music]
some of them are pretty important some
not so important
there's uh we've done them in
chronological order as you would start
your engine
and uh hopefully this will be of use to
you all
you can go to our website svmpavidusd
go to downloads and we will put this
pre-start list on there as a download as
a pdf for you
so that you can download it and stick it
in the engine bay or just use it as a
reference document so there's no charge
no no fees nothing like that
um just to say if you do download it and
give it to people just credit hustle or
buy some beer
okay so i'll go to the engine bay turn
the other camera on
and cindy's going to read off the uh the
items as we go through
okay right so
other cameras on this is our engine bay
hopefully uh
we've got some light there and you can
see what's going on but i'll try and
zoom in where i can
so what's the first item cindy check the
oil level on the dipstick
it should be between the upper and lower
limits beware of high
oil levels this can indicate water in
the oil or fuel
in the oil okay pop up and top up as
necessary
okay so our dipstick is here our engine
hasn't been started for a while i'm just
going to wipe
our dipstick off put it back in again
and our oil level is
just below don't you see that i'm about
to drip oil
just below the top and bottom marks
so as cindy said if your oil level
appears to be
increasing it can be a telltale
that you've got water going into the
engine
um and that can be
because your anti-siphon valve is not
working properly
and you've siphoned water into the
exhaust
and then that's gone through an inlet
manifold i'll put a little diagram here
and show you how that can get in
the other thing is that you can have
weeping injectors or leaking injectors
the diesel will then weep into the top
of the
combustion chamber and go down the sides
of the piston and the piston rings and
into the oil
and what that will do is that will
increase the level of the oil so it's
quite important
that if you see your oil level rising
from one day to the next
that you investigate why that is
and i've dripped oil on the floor what
was number two cindy
number two check the oil filler cap for
emulsified oil which
is white or a yellow paste okay so
this is again quite important if you're
topping up your oil you're going to need
to remove
your oil filler cap and this is usually
on the top
of the engine and what you want to look
for
is inside the oil cap or filler cap
that there is no white
like a paste a whitey yellowy paste um
looks a bit like mayonnaise if you've
got that in there
then that's a telltale sign that you've
got
um water in your engine
it may be fresh water it may be coolant
it may be
salt water but you need to investigate
that so
just one of those regular things to do
check the
oil filler cap and make sure it's clean
make sure there's no emulsified oil in
there
make sure the o-ring is okay and you can
do that when you top your oil up
so that's how we do that what's the next
one cindy number three gearbox oil check
look for water ingress or higher than
expected levels
or discolored oil okay so
most modern boats have sail drives
but some still have a shaft drive now
your gearbox
quite often will be cooled as well with
a heat exchanger
and what you're looking for is you're
looking again for oil levels that have
come up
which would indicate that something is
is getting into the oil and bringing it
up
and the same as your engine when when
the oil comes up what's actually
happening is the oil is floating on top
of the water because it's less dense
and it's giving you a false high reading
what you're actually doing
is you're reading the depth of water in
the sump or in the gearbox
plus the oil so it's a really good
indicator that you've got a seal gone
or something is a miss now our
gearbox oil is right over the back of
the engine
um and i'm sure you don't want to see my
backside
um doing a full moon let's see if i can
get in there
and just check it
now we did actually check this the other
day when we serviced the engine
and you can see our oil is
clean no
emulsifisation of mayonnaise on the top
there
nice clean oil let's just put it back in
check the depth
[Applause]
and again just between the top and the
bottom marks
on that dipstick again we've got an
o-ring there just check that's okay
which it is and then we can put that one
back
that's our gearbox
and drive leg oil checked
what's the next one cindy number four
raw water
filter check then re-prime if necessary
okay so
um sometimes it's called a strainer it's
a raw water
strain or a raw water filter now
as it's always tight
and obviously it's salt water so what
happens is when you take the lid off
you just want to be aware
that salt water you don't want to drip
it all over the engine
just wipe that o-ring off carefully
oh you're rattling away well and
there's our basket and as you can see
it's a bit discolored
but it's clean now
that locates back in there and sits down
re-priming now our
strainer is well above our water level
on the outside of the boat our water
level on it on this boat is about here
at the top of the engine you can just
see the water level there
now before we put the lid back on
we need to prime that piece of hose
because
the pump will be drawing in air for a
little while
and because this is so high we need to
top this up
and just prime it and you'll find that
on a lot of modern
engines you need to re-prime
the raw water strainer or filter before
you start the engine now if i was to
pull water straight down there
it would go back down the inlet hose
out the bottom of the leg and be
absolutely no use at all for priming
so what we have to do is turn off our
raw water
valve which is down here
and then we top the raw water
strainer box up
here's a kettle i prepared earlier
now the leveling now has gone up
just check the top make sure that o-ring
is going to seat
properly back on
and now we can reopen the raw water
inlet
which will allow the water to
flow back down that pipe but it will
actually be full to the water level if
that makes sense
quite important on some of these modern
engines
the way in which they're installed so i
can now open that valve
and we know that that is now primed and
full of water
what's the next one cindy uh the raw
water
pump and hoses check okay
so on these uh on this particular engine
our raw water pump is at the front you
know we've we've done the
servicing how to service that what we're
looking for
is around the back of the pump there
are two opposing lip seals
one keeps the oil in the engine and the
other one
keeps the water in the pump if those
start to degrade or break down
you will have either water or oil
dripping from the back of the pump it's
an easy fix
it's in one of our other videos in fact
i think it's in two of our videos
but we're just looking for any leaks
any oil look around the clamps make sure
they're not leaking
check the hoses visually make sure
there's no leaks
and down to the heat exchanger
one of the things that's really
important of course is when you keep
your engine clean if you have got
a leak you will see it straight away as
soon as you
start doing a visual inspection so we're
okay on that one sydney what's the next
one
check the coolant level and then for any
leaks in the hoses or towel ends
on this engine we've put a coolant
header tank
up a little bit higher than the heat
exchanger previously it was mounted down
the front
the reason we've done that is that it
stops
air being trapped in the heat exchanger
and gives you the full
the full internal volume of the heat
exchanger
uh full of coolant there's no air locks
or anything in there
so if you look here our coolant's there
it's
just in between the minimum and the
maximum marks
there's no coolant leaking out of here
there's none around the coolant pump the
hoses are good
there's no coolant around the bottom or
around the back
uh our coolant doesn't need topping up
it's all okay
so that's that check done what's the
next one cindy uh the electrical check
the cables and insulation connections
okay so one of the
one of the things that we're looking for
is we're looking for connections
around the splitters here this is our
charge
splitter this splits off the charge from
our alternator
to our domestic batteries our
starter battery which is under here and
our bow thruster battery
so they're all looking good um
one place in particular that you need to
look at
is down the side of the engine on the
starter mode to make sure
that there's no corrosion around the
starter motor cables and that's the
usually the big red one the positive is
the one that you get
a bit of corrosion around but also
there's
a small wire on the back of most starter
motors
which is the energizer cable
for the solenoid and those corrode
and you cannot see them corroding
because they're usually
covered in heat shrink or they're on one
of these little spade clips
and one of the things that happens is
when they corrode inside you don't see
it
you go to start your engine and you
think your batteries are flat
because you get this click click click
of the solenoid
and what that is is it's not the starter
motor or solenoid that's a problem
it's that one little connection and i've
seen people go off and buy new batteries
or go and buy a new starter motor fit
them
and have exactly the same problem so you
need to check
that those cables aren't haven't got
salt corrosion on them
well made we can actually get in the
side of our engine here
through our heads and check all of those
things out
you don't need to do it every time but
it's good practice to keep an eye on it
every two or three weeks or so so
no issues with corrosion in here nice
and clean and tidy
and all our connections are okay what's
the next one cindy
the belts and tension check you would
see in the manual
right so we have serpentine belts or
multi-v
groove belts on this engine that drive
our 130 amp alternator
we don't have any auxiliary drives for a
fridge or compressor
or hydraulic pumps or anything so we
only have a single belt
but you may have more than one belt on
your engine
these belts need to be kept in good
condition they need to be tight
but not over tight and generally
just on the longest side which is either
this one here at the top
or the one at the bottom they should be
able to move
with light finger pressure um half an
inch
no more um 10 10 to 12 centimeters no
more than that
you can do more damage by over
tightening the belt
than having it too loose if it's too
loose it will slip
but if it's over tight you'll damage the
bearings
in the coolant pump and you'll damage
the bearings in your alternator or your
auxiliary drives
so don't go mad over tightening it
um this one's good it's uh
it's actually been on there five years
now so that shows you that
uh the belts can be made to last
uh five years is good and it's still not
got any cracks
any crazy and it's not shiny and worn so
yep we've got a good belt there our
alternator is nice and
firm solid on the top there there's no
movement
nothing in the adjusters i'm quite happy
with that
what's the next one cindy the shut off
cable or the emergency stop
ah right now
um there's there's two different types
of problem the first problem is if you
have a conventional
uh cable which goes to a shut off
valve on your diesel pump and that
breaks or slides or slips what happens
is
you can get your engine out of gear but
you can't stop your engine
so we don't have that on this engine
we have an electronic solenoid
which allows the fuel on or off to start
and stop the engine should that solenoid
fail
in the open condition we wouldn't be
able to stop our engine
and so down here you can just see that
there is an emergency stop
lever on the pump if the engine
won't stop and that it speaks through an
electrical fault
then we can come down open the bombay
doors
and uh just push that lever over
to stop the engine and that works okay
we know that works okay
um i did actually stop the engine with
it the other day
when i was working on my own so
it's in good condition it's working and
it's free
and as is actually marked with emergency
stop
what's the next one cindy the throttle
and gear linkage checks
okay throttle and gear linkage um
i would say that the gear linkage is
probably the most
important of these two and here's the
reason
you're coming into a berth or coming
into a mooring
or a dock and you're in gear in forward
gear
and you take it out of gear to the
neutral position
and nothing happens you have no way
of stopping your boat unless
you can stop the engine because the
gearbox
will remain engaged in whatever position
it is either in forward or reversed or
even in neutral
now as is is on the back of the engine
down by a gearbox
and it's one of those things that we
check regularly
i'll see if i can put a little insert
picture
down here somewhere to show you how it
works and the other one of course is
your throttle linkage
so on ours it comes directly
through an isolation clamp as most volvo
sail drives do
because the sail drive on volvos are
isolated from the engine um electrically
to to to stop corrosion
galvanic action so this one is good here
on the throttle
it's not moved until isolation rubbers
are in position
the clamp back here is good
there's no movement there and i'll just
check our gearbox one
yep that's good little split pins still
in there
everything's tight nothing wobbling
so that's quite an important check i've
seen boats
or we've seen boats haven't we
particularly
a big power boat in i think it was in
port solon
a few years ago 10 12 years ago a
gentleman came in
using both his engines to position his
motorboat
in the right place as he came into the
dock
one of the gearbox cables came loose
came off the engine off the gearbox and
he then proceeded at
about three quarter throttle half
throttle
to go up the pontoon and uh knocked out
all the electric for the ponto and quite
funny wouldn't it
well not funny for him i suppose but
those simple checks
will just uh just allow you not to be
embarrassed when
you're maneuvering into position so
what's the next one cindy
the engine mounts and the drive linkage
check
okay so we have direct drive our gearbox
is connected
directly to our sail drive if you're on
a boat with a shaft
you will know that you have two flanges
or a vari drive but there will be a
connection
between the gearbox and the shaft and
quite often those things are overlooked
so on a regular basis and it doesn't
need to be
every time you start your engine you
just need to check for loose bolts make
sure the alignment's okay
make sure everything is working or
looking as it should be
also if you have a shaft obviously
you're going to have a shaft seal
and you need to be looking for drips or
or leakage around that um
what else uh yeah some of these shaft
seals
have they're called dripless
they're not always dripless but you need
to keep an eye
on how much they are or are not dripping
on ours our drive is directly to
our flywheel via
percussion plate so we can't actually
inspect that
but shaft drives there's something else
you need to look at
the other thing is that our engine is
mounted on two
engine mounts at the front and then the
third engine mount is actually on the
back of the gearbox
and that's what allows the engine to be
moved around
with the sail drive the cell drive
connected directly
so if you have loose bolts on your
engine mounts or the one at the back
just a regular inspection make sure
they're okay if your engine's vibrating
quite a lot when you run it you might
find that
the vulcanization between the rubber
mounts and the bolt
has come undone and you've then got to
replace your engine mount
obviously on a shaft drive boat
fiddling with the engine mountains will
change the alignment between the shaft
and the engine so just be aware if
you're going to change engine mounts on
a shaft drive boat
that you will need to realign the engine
and that's something you should do
fairly regularly
to check just make sure that your
alignment's good
otherwise you'll run your cutlass
bearing out either
inside your outer shaft or on your p
bracket
so we're all good here all in good
condition
a bit of dust on there but otherwise
we're okay
what's the next one cindy who put check
the fuel is switched
on and visually check the fuel lines and
water separator
okay so our fuel cut off switch
is in our aft cabin uh
i believe the reason they've done that
is that should there be an engine fire
you don't need to open this hatch
to switch the fuel off you can do it
without opening the hatch
so i've just turned that on i know
that's okay
and the other thing was sorry
fuel and the water separator
done the water separator up right water
separator yeah
so in the back of our engine bay
we have a primary filter with a water
separator and it's got a little glass
bowl in the bottom
we check that just visually every now
and then
yeah that's okay we've got clean fuel in
there if you've got one of the raikou
ones and it's up a bit higher
you'll probably be able to see it better
than we can on ours
but yeah that's an indication that
you've got water in your
fuel and that your separators having to
pull it out so
keep an eye on those if you've got one
of the cav
type primary filters there's a little
drain plug on the bottom
um and it's a good idea you know once a
month or so
maybe more frequently just to drain the
filter bowl
off the bottom and check that you
haven't got water or bits and pieces in
there
if you have then you have one of two
problems either you've got condensation
forming in the tank
or you have water being put into the
tank
and that can happen in two ways either
the o-ring
on your fuel filler is allowing salt
water or
rain water to get past the filler cap or
you've been given some dodgy fuel
we have a filter that we can put our
diesel through which
separates the diesel from any muck or
any water
um and that that's the prime thing
is to not actually have the water being
put in the tank in the first place
so on airboat the heater plugs are fully
automatic
via a timed relay on the side of the
engine
on some boats you may have to push a
button
to use your heater plugs don't use them
excessively they'll actually glow white
hot if you use them
for too long your manual should tell you
the length of time you need to activate
them and it's usually somewhere between
five and 10 seconds so to start our
engine
all we have to do is push our start
button
and then we're going to do a couple of
checks now your engine should start
within three to five seconds
i'm going to stop airs just for a minute
and explain
why you shouldn't keep pushing
the start button let me show you in the
diagram
so from previous videos you know that
your sea water pump is driven
directly from your engine either on the
crankshaft or via a pulley
if you continue to start the engine or
rotate it
that pump will continue to pump water
through the system
eventually it will fill up your exhaust
hose
and then flow back through the exhaust
manifold
and into the engine so just for
illustration purposes
you can hear that alarm going off when i
stop the engine
using this button here
there's obviously no wall pressure and
uh the ignition's on so the alarm has
come on
and i can either stop that by hitting
the
alarm button or
by turning the start circuits off
so i'm going to go through the start
sequence on our boat
it's just running through itself
diagnostics
two bleeps means all the alarms are okay
and we're ready to start
three or four seconds and the engine
bursts into life
we're ticking over okay and our engine
hours are
14 34 so i'll put that in the log as
14 34
well sorry 14 35
because we're gonna run it for five ten
minutes and just make sure
everything's okay and the next thing
we're going to be looking for
let's go over the back of the boat
[Music]
is we've got water coming out the
exhaust and there's plenty of it and
we're now going to let the engine warm
up
lovely sunny day here in le carter bit
chilly
a lovely sunny day all right let's go to
the next item on our checklist okay so
we've just been through outside starting
the engine and the sequence that we use
for
what i wanted to do is come back out of
the wind
and tell you some of the things that you
should look for
when you're starting your engine well
obviously the water that we've seen
coming out the exhaust if you've got a
dry exhaust
you'll normally have a telltale which
will put water out somewhere or a
pressure switch which will
which you tell you that your raw water
system is pressurized and you've
actually got
um raw water going through your heat
exchanger
and exchanging heat with the with the um
engine coolant um again we've been
through that
on a previous uh video
so i'll see if i can put a link down
here somewhere to
to engine cooling so that you can have a
look at that
within three to five seconds of you
starting the engine
if you've got a water cooled exhaust you
should have a very
reasonable amount of water coming out it
shouldn't be just a dribble
um and lastly um
all engines all all four-stroke engines
will give a slight puff of smoke when
you start them
um it's not unusual it's part of the
cold uh
starting process that some of the fuel
might not be burnt and you might have a
little puff of
of dark smoke black smoke or a little
puff of white smoke
but it certainly shouldn't go on
if you've got excessive smoke after
starting your engine
i would say probably 30 seconds to a
minute after starting
and there is some form of smoke coming
out
either blue smoke from burning oil
white smoke from incomplete burn or
black smoke from
over-fuelling then you really need to
look at that because
if you're over fuelling you can get
diesel
around the rings and down into the oil
to make your oil level go up
if you're not burning your fuel
efficiently you're getting white smoke
uh the air is being suffocated from your
engine from
a blocked air filter or
or indeed by an exhaust elbow that's
blocked or partially blocked
then you really need to look at that
because as smoke
is a telltale sign that something is
wrong
that you're not getting a good burn
inside your engine
not only can you do damage to the engine
but you can cause something catastrophic
uh by continuing to run that engine when
you've got excessive
smoke
and finally really one of the most
important things we would say
about looking after your diesel engine
in your boat
you need to do visual checks um
you know it it takes you five minutes
just to look around the engine
uh you know touch things run your hands
around it piece of cloth
make sure you haven't got any leaks and
make sure there's no water in the builds
that's coming from somewhere
um and keeping a clean engine bay
if you keep a clean engine bay you will
see these things happening
way before they become a major problem
and it's invariably
when you need to rely on your engine
that
not taking notice not doing the right
maintenance
not doing visual checks will bite you on
the
back side so from
here on impedance me my shiny head in
the sun
um we'd like to say thanks for watching
uh thanks to our patreons
you guys great we couldn't do these
videos
without your patronage um thanks to
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and if this video has been useful to you
pop over to our website and download the
engine starting
um spreadsheet or that we've done
it might just be helpful to you and uh
if we can pass a bit of knowledge on
and make something useful to you well
that's what we're all about here on
impedance
so from now from me i'm from cindy who's
over there
i'm looking over here now you're over
here now
bye folks thanks for watching sail safe