Critical Engineer Questions you MUST know the right answer for.

[Dosedmonkey]

Well to try and help those engineer cadets prepping for oral and written exams, I thought there should be a list of key questions and items, that they must know and get correct, or it will be an automatic fail.

If you can think of any please post them for debate, I just have a few here to get us started.



Ones I blieve you must know.

Do you know how to blow down a gauge glass properly.

Do you know how to react to a crank case oil mist.

Do you know how to react to a scavenge fire.

Procedure for Enclosed Space entry and what constitutes to an enclosed space.

[Chiefy]

How do you take over a watch /UMS

Whats required for a UMS / Watchkeeping walk about

How do you pump bilges? Whats the rules? Can you pump bilges overboard?

What do you do if you think your relief is not fit to take over the watch?

ALL pipeline system, where are they likely to go, how may the be monitored what sort of safety systems?

Economiser fire, who what where when?

Flash up a boiler from COLD, safety systems /checks

Flash up a generator and put it on load, basic switchboard protection devices

Odd noises from a running engine what actions do you take?

Air compressors.....sketch / describe

Different types of pump, what are they best suited too

Electrical protections whats the difference between a fuse and a breaker

[Dosedmonkey]

How would you know you had a Start Air Valve leaking;
i) When engine stopped
ii) When engine running

Chiefy, should it not be the difference between an Over Current Relay and Fuse?

[GuinnessMan]

Main one, how do you start a main engine and why is each bit important?

Actions on discovering a fire?

Actions in the event that the abandoned ship is called?

Now a biggie (more for the seniors than cadets, but results should be interesting). You are serving on a VLCC and you have a fire in your pump room. The Pump man has not reported to his muster station and was last seen going into the pump room. The fire is starting to get out of control and you have two options. Fight the fire using hoses and BA sets or use a CO2 drenching system. What would you do and why?

[Dosedmonkey]

Actions in the event that the abandoned ship is called?

That doesn't come up in Orals and Written EKs as it is a seperate certification. Or am I missing something here? Whilst something like discovering a fire in the engine room space, is more specific to engineering ticket, so could come up, but is a bit of common sense as Class 4 level.

As for the VLCC, you mean cargo pump room right? And usually they do not ask this a less you work on tankers, for similar reason, you need tanker certification, they usually just word it as, you have a fire in the engine room and require to put CO2 in but not all personel have mustered, what do you do. But this is a senior question, wrong thread, and not sure if it is wholey appropraite for cadet forum as its quite horrible the correct answer.

[meg]

Here are some questions that come up quite often. i will put their marking value next to them as I seem to not be getting full marks for the questions. Hope you can help :-)

1. EXPLAIN why the correct tappet clearances are essential on the inlet and exhaust valves of a four-stroke diesel engine, (4marks)
2.a) With reference to centrifugal seperators, STATE two factors that have an influence on the seperating process. (4marks)
2.b) Give two reasons for a purifiier not attaining full running speed.
3.a) In the case of a main engine and controllable pitch propeller not responding to bridge control, DESCRIBE the routine for changing to engine room control. (4marks)
3.b) EXPLAIN how manual control of a fuel pump delivery is achieved when emergency manovering on a large 2-stroke crosshead engine. (4marks)
4. DESCRIBE the conditions that must be satisfied before paralleling an a.c generator with the main electrical switchboard. For each condition DESCRIBE/EXPLAIN how it is achieved. (8 marks)

This is all I have for now as there are a lot of papers to sift through and pick out the ones I am struggling with. If you can help it would be much appreciated and when I finally do pass I owe you all a pint :-)

[bw5991]

Main one, how do you start a main engine and why is each bit important?

Actions on discovering a fire?

Actions in the event that the abandoned ship is called?

Now a biggie (more for the seniors than cadets, but results should be interesting). You are serving on a VLCC and you have a fire in your pump room. The Pump man has not reported to his muster station and was last seen going into the pump room. The fire is starting to get out of control and you have two options. Fight the fire using hoses and BA sets or use a CO2 drenching system. What would you do and why?

If it wasn't an oil ship I would want to say hoses as we'd rather not take the chance of drowning the Pump man in CO2, however the risk of the ship going boom seems a bit more life threatening..

[Dosedmonkey]

1) Tappet clearances allow for expansion of the valves when heated, if the clearance is too small the valve will not close correctly, if the clearance is too big, the valve will open late and close early.

2)a) I can see multiple ways of answering this, is it just meant to be like gravity and centrifugal force, with the diagram of gravity pointing down, centrifugal force pointing out and flow direction between plates or
Angular speed, the speed of which the purifier rotates at, greater the speed, greater the centrifugal force seperating the fluid. Effective radius, as the radius of the fluid being seperated is greater, the greater the seperation effect, however we are limited by engineering constraints as this arises balancing and handling problems, and also means water and sludge has further to travel to the outside.
b) i. Motor clutch shoes in poor condition, not allowing good transfer of power to purifier bowl spindle.
ii. Purifier bowl failing to close, this causes resistance and unbalancing on bowl and increased motor ampage.

3.a) On a CPP unit there can be varying ways to take local control, if you still have power to the the CPP unit, and pressure from its pump, you may be able to adjust the angle by manually operating solenoids. If you do not have power, and the system is fail set, the CPP will stop in the position it is in, and may have a hand pump you can adjust its position with. Some systems however are fail-full-ahead or fail-full-astern, where when there is a loss of electrical power they will default to these positions. This is why it is important to learn your system when first on board.

b) To manually control the fuel delivery system you must go to the control box located near the governor, here you must line the manual control wheel, by winding it in or out, so it is inline with the current fuel position, then you can disconnect the fuel control linkage, by winding its gear across from the governor's position, in to neutral, before on to the local hand control gear. You will need at least two people to control the engine manually, one to take the controls, another to keep the eye on engine parameters such as exhaust temperatures. You must not overspeed or load the generator, and you must also travel through barred ranges of speed with good pace.

4) Voltage - controled by AVR controlling excitation of generator, this will be displayed on incoming volt meter.
Frequency - controlled by the engines speed, and as such by engines fuel governor, this should appear as a slight clockwise movement on synchroscope, as well as on incoming frequency meter.
Phase Direction - can only be made incorrect if alternators cables disconnected, must make sure they are placed back on RYB.
Phase Angle - This needs to be as close as possible to zero difference to the board, you achieve this by making sure the synchro scope is at the 12 o'clock position when closing the breaker.
On modern vessels they have a synchro check, that will prevent you closing the breaker if any of the four above criteria are not correct.

I would be doing drawings too if this wasn't the internet, they help a lot.

[Dosedmonkey]

If it wasn't an oil ship I would want to say hoses as we'd rather not take the chance of drowning the Pump man in CO2, however the risk of the ship going boom seems a bit more life threatening..

They usually word it in a way, you want to put CO2 in, but there is someone missing. So you might suggest sending a search party in for them, but not worry about how to extinguish the fire exactly. The correct answer is, "Regretably, I would have to place the CO2 in as preservation of the other peoples lifes on the ship, requires preservation of the rest of the ship, and longer I leave the fire more likely it is to grow in intensity and/or spread, if I sent in a search party, not only would it delay extinguishing the fire but also put the fire parties life in danger". The idea is to be sincere about weighing up the situation.

[meg]

Thanks for those answers they were great depth, unfortunately I sailed on a very small standby vessel and even one crew wouldnt let me in the engine room so lost a few trips due to ignoramuses. As for my other trips I had a lot of catchin up to do and we werent aloud to do much as we had to constanly be running during standby which was all the time so didnt get to see much. As for question 2. im not sure what they would be looking for but ill take what your wrote into my lecturers tomoro and see if they can shed some light on which the examiner would prefer. I cant thank you enough

[Chiefy]

3.b) EXPLAIN how manual control of a fuel pump delivery is achieved when emergency manovering on a large 2-stroke crosshead engine. (4marks)

Not sure what engine the previous attempt at 3b was answering but never seen what was described.

To me they are meaning, going to local control station, but the engine in manual manual which on old (non electrnic controlled slow speed engines ...ie RTA. RND, MC,'s etc) would mean changing to engine side control in the ECR, going to local control station and putting it in local too, respog to the telegraph repeater, then moving the fuel level and operating the start air button or lever to s required for the order.

The old MAN KG's (I thnk) had a big ass wheel you turned initially to "Start" this did start air and "min" fuel and engine started turning it further adjusted the revs....HOWEVER on occasion the revs where very close to start air off you had to start the engine seed up a tad to stop the start air THEN reduce back but that was very engine dependent

The Sulzers, have 2 big levers, one for start ahead, stop start astern, then a fuel lever.....again you follow the telegraph orders, after taking local control.

On both systems there are some interlocks for when you move the fuel leverslocally to stop the auto telegraph functions. Also in both cases alarm and shut down monitoring will be mch reduced from normal operation and if you are using these systems GET MORE BODIES to the engine room.

The electrnic engines Flex and ME are pretty much a varition of the remote system, no mechanical lincages, if the electrnoics is that FUBA ship is going nowhere it mainly by asses all the gubins in the Bridge ECR so will alwengine start if some or all the remote system has thrown a wobbler OR suffer massive failure (accom fire or similar)


Having re-read the question this they really are interested in the local control, ie big old levers and local rev counter directly activating the fuel rack and by-passing the governor.

Open to other interpretations though :-)

[chris]

Going back to the fuses and circuit breakers/over current relay issue, the most basic protective functions of a circuit breaker are short circuit, over current and under voltage protection. They can also protect against phase difference,over voltage trip, reverse power, under/over freq, earth faults etc.

These various protections are generally combined in an electronic protection module which opens the circuit breaker using the UV trip method.

[meg]

thanks guys this is all really helpful. Chiefy I will look up the whole question and show you the answer I was given in class however its not getting full marks

[meg]

ok the full question of the 3 is:
QUESTION:

3a) In the case of a main engine and CPP not responding to bridge control, DESCRIBE the routine for changing to engine room control

ANSWER:

-indicate to bridge that you want to go to E/R control
-They should acknowledge the change
-Match the comparitors (speed and pitch control) the same as the E/R and bridge.
-Then change to E/R control ia panel
-Change the speed and res as required

QUESTION 3b):

EXPLAIN how manual control of fuel pump deliery is achieed when emergency manoeering on a large 2-stroke crosshead engine.

ANSWER:

-Reduce engine load
-Reversing / in the same position as present running
-Put blocking arm in position for engine side control
-Move handwheel to disconnect fuel p/ps from govenor and connect to local manual handwheel
-Move change oer ale to position for engine side control.

This was the answer I was given by lecturers a couple weeks ago

[Chiefy]

of which I recognise non of that procedure......take local control, pass to engine side control, most 2 strokes have nothing to disconnect, you are pulling pushing big old levers.......anyone got an RTA manual in pdf good drawing in there