I was exaggerating a bit, but I do work on large HFO/MDO engines.
We have to do constant monitoring and repairs. Please don’t say my colleagues are incompetent, but we often struggle to find the source of certain problems (even when the man from MAN is here):
- Injector heads dying too fast.
- Injector springs breaking - and yes, it is always the impossible to inspect inner one.
- cooling issues despite having brand new box coolers that are better in every way than the bad but faultless predecessors.
- preheating pump motors dying after 4 years when they should last 20.
- Cracked crankcase mist vent pipe that manufacturer cannot manage to remanufacture...
- Exhaust heat sensors that just die in random conditions.
- Turbo oil seals that fail slowly.
And it goes on, but this is considered normal ops, even better than average and we have a 100% reliability record. These are marine engines built to far higher standards than car engines.
These engine supply 5 propulsion motors (3 pods, 2 thrusters) an during the last five years we have just added grease to the bearings. That’s it, a few CCs grease.
We also have large battery packs (small rooms), and nothing to report on those - even welds.
The only main drive electrical nuisance to report are two large capacitors that failed in a cloud of smoke, the sparkies can fix that in minutes, even an injector is a least an hour job.