Shipboard Maintenance: Pressure Washing the Ship’s Main Engine & Auxiliaries

Can you see the casualty before it happens? I was once asked to survey the operational condition and readiness of a ship’s engineering and propulsion plant prior to purchase. Well, what I found was totally unacceptable! The equipment was so dirty and grimy one could barely make out the color of paint on the main engines and their associated components. I immediately requested that the equipment be pressure washed prior to my inspection.

I then looked at the operations logs and found what looked like an excess amount of lube oil consumption — my suspicions were right on. After pressure washing the equipment and then operating it – I observed lube oil leaks everywhere. You just couldn’t appreciate them initially due to the accumulation of oil and grime.

What sights and sounds might you encounter when inspecting a ship’s engine room? Check out the video below taken on a 300m, 5000 TEU container ship.

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Ship Maintenance: Descaling is Critical for Effective Heat Transfer

Water scale on any heat transfer surface reduces the effectiveness of that heat transfer. In turn, this results in reduced equipment efficiency while increasing energy consumption, increasing costs and even increasing plant operational downtime. Often this “buildup” problem is either ignored or relegated to “fixing it at the last minute or upon mechanical failure” status because of downtime costs. This is historically based on the premise that descaling takes a great deal of time.

As a marine engineer, this brings focus to one very important concern – every cruise and merchant ship must be self-sustaining as far as the production of fresh water is concerned.

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Cruise Ship Or Cursed Ship – Shipboard Maintenance

Goodway’s Just Venting is a platform for information and education. In that spirit, we would like to welcome new readers with maritime ties – those responsible for maintaining cruise ships and other vessels. In this post, we’ll discuss how to prevent a cruise ship from becoming a cursed ship with a simple ship board maintenance plan. Without further adieu, Vince DaSilva, our newest blog team member, shares his unique view based on long and storied experience.

Having sailed the world more than a few times during my 30-plus year career with the U.S. Navy and Merchant Marines as well as having served as Chief Engineer, I’ve observed plenty of cruise ships coming and going. The first thing that always crossed my mind was the imaginary experience of being the Chief Engineer on board one of those floating cities and hearing, “Chief Engineer, you’re wanted on the bright” over the public address system.

(Below is a video of a cursed cruise ship being towed into port. )

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