[Challisstern]

After I left the sea I was working at a shipyard in Tampa Florida that were building 5 product tankers for MSC ( Yank RFA), they had single screw Sulzer RNDM 68 engines, new to me.
One of the systems was the CJC sytstem as they called it , which was piston rod lube oil drains into a tank with a pump and fine filter which transferred the oil back to the crankcase.
I know the earlier Sulzers didn't have that nor did Poppet valve B&W's.
Can anybody tell me why this engine had this system?

With other engines scavenge oil drained away to external buckets and the stuffing box kept the crankcase clear of contamination. I cannot see having forced lubrication of the stuffing box as there would be enough oil sloshing about to lubricate the piston rod. I have never come across excessive wear on piston rods, so obviously a well tried and trusted system.

Another strange thing it had was a connection from the LOP to the oil filled stern tube. Now things would be have to be pretty bad to have to purify that oil for mainly water. Cannot say I have ever come across a ship with that system. In fact the stern tube would hold very little oil in the scheme of things. Your lower after ER bulkhead was the start of your stern tube.
I decided to put the LOP on the stern tube and purify the oil, it sucked the outer seals in, so there was something wrong there.
But then this American designed ship was a bit East meets West for somethings such as sounding fuel tanks with sounding tapes( US design) but generators that would start up and go on the board without human interaction ( Norwegian design) plus Saab cargo tank sounding devices using electronics ( Swedish), no local stop/ start for ER pumps particularly lockable stop (American).

 

[taffe65]

In my time the stuffing boxes drained to the piston rod drains tank (crankcase oil side) with the spent cylinder oil being vented to scavenge drains, the drain tk then being transferred to the eng room sludge tk as waste oil as and when needed ( not very often if the stuffing boxes are doing their job).This CJC system from my googlings is a recycling process which uses a cartridge type fine filter to clean the drained /contaminated oil as its pumped back into the main engine sump,they buy the spare filters from Halfrauds at hugely inflated prices 🤣 .

 

[Challisstern]

Thanks Taffe65. So the CJC may take out the particles but not the acidity which would still contaminate the oil. So with the minor amounts of oil going through to the CJC tank was it worth it do you think.
Was this system peculiar to Sulzers?
Don't ever remember a piston rod drain tank unless it drained into the sludge tank were the scavenge drains could go on a 3 way cock, but they always went into old Gamelin drums so you could keep an eye for leaks, wet or dry scavenges.

I cannot say I had much crankcase experience as I was only 3/E for one voyage (B&W) and I don't think we pulled any units, though we had some shoreside yanks changing a liner perhaps for insurance purposes rather than let the ships staff do it. The repair firm put out a call for an expert on B&W's to guide them , when he arrived he had never seen a poppet valve only the opposed piston.

I went from 4th with the one voyage as extra 3rd (both us 3rds had just got our 2nds and the 2nd had just got his plus the Chief had just got his Motor Endorsement so there were 4 new tickets with the signature still wet) to 2nd and had a 4 stroke MAN for my babtism.

Same engine as the QE2 re-engine, but ours was the ME not a DA. It was one of a pair of Booth Line ships being built in Rio. They had LO and FO backwash filters, another new one for everybody. Those ships had their teething problems due to poor workmanship and lack of commissioning by makers men.

 

[makko]

The diaphragm seals were to separate cylinder lubrication by products from the crankcase oil. Typically, on first orders, the cyl. lubricators would be set at max, notch 8 from memory, and as the engine warmed through, would be backed off. The cylinder oil was high alkali to neutralize the acidity, this mainly occuring during start-up/first orders of a warmed through but, effectively, still "cold" engine (STBY, not Full Away constant speed/all temps./press.). The recovered oil went to the sludge tank. The oil could be burned in the incinerator or, more usually, transferred ashore along with all the other oily sludge waste, but the Cyl. oil was NEVER mixed with the crankcase LO, cleanliness being next to godliness! The Cyl. oil drains were good indicators of any leakage in the piston telescopic CW pipes, although I never encountered any leakage on any Sulzer engine.

CC Pounder only says:

Rgds.
Dave

 

[John Gowers]

Hi Guys I believe from memory the fuel filters in the Denholms gas turbine ships were made by CJC. I thought CJC was just a trade name for a cartridge type filter, I have seen them on a few ships and rigs where they were also used to filter hydraulic oil.
I sailed with many Sulzer and B&W engines but do not remember any cyl oil reclamation systems. Do remember cleaning out scavenge spaces and changing out stuffing boxes when pulling units. Photo shows me checking piston rod stuffing boxes on a RD90 Sulzer, in Kepple shipyard, 1986.

 

[Brian Dobbie]

CJC is Mr.C.C.Jensen the Danish(?) guy who invented/designed the waste oil renovation system.

 

[taffe65]

Think we're going down a rabbit hole here guys, nobody's mentioned recycling cylinder oil as I,m sure we're all fully aware that's it would be detrimental to the system oil. Cracking foto John as per usual.

 

[Challisstern]

Looking at that excellent diagram supplied by Taffe, it would seem the majority of the oil would be captured by the lower scraper rings and returned to the crankcase un-contaminated, but the drain from the sealing rings would have the chance of being contaminated and thus piped away to the sludge tank. If its that drain that is returned to a piston oil drain return tank, then any contaminent would dissolve in the oil as it would take some time for the tank to fill before being filtered and pumped back to the crankcase. This US built ship was the first one I had seen with this system and during my sea going career all those drains went to the sludge tank as most of you have experienced.
I will see if Sulzer/Wartsila can shed any light on the logic of the system if they deign to answer.
The engines were MHI and IHI Sulzers all shipped out dissembled in large wooden crates, the parts covered in a waxy grease encapsulated in sealed tinfoil bags. It seemed that the ship carrying them had to tranship into barges by the Skyway Bridge St. Petersburg in Florida, at least one of the boxes was lost at some point during lifting.
All 5 engines in boxes were stored at an old Westinghouse plant that had good craneage and barge access. We used the same plant for building the afterbodies, fwd ER bulkhead to stern frame. All machinery modules built and piped up on the floor of one of the bays marked out with ships centre line and frames for positioning. The heaviest module was about 20 tons ( plate coolers for central cooling system). The concrete floor of the bay represented the tank top.
All pipes were pre made in the pipe shop, machinery levelled and mounted on the foundations in another area with good craneage. This separated the pipefitters and machinists giving both more room to work.
Once the structural tank top and that part of the hull was finished the machinery modules were lifted on foundations scribed, cut and welded, inter connecting pipe spools fitted. All work was geared to module assembly and worked very efficiently. The tradesmen enjoyed the work as they had room to move, working out of the sun with all services to hand like oxy/acetyline, compressed air, power, welders, lifting gantries etc.

Tank top ER section being lifted off a barge that had come from the old Westinghouse plant and about to be plaved in the drydock. Machinery for the middles and top plates would be shipped over once the engine was assembled, from bedplate , frames, entablature etc.
The CJC tank can be seen in the port after corner. The pump was originally designed to sit on a 6" high foundation on the tank tops until I saw it and suggested mounting it on the tank side, this was approved and any subsequent drawings changed. This proved a better idea all round from erection to operation.
The other weird thing they did was to use open grating on the bottom plates and chequer plate above, which would mean any debris could fall on the top of the motor and into the fan casing. This was perhaps how they cut costs when they built the Lakers at American Shipyards on the Great Lakes. Some of the senior design staff came down from there and brought their old fashioned ideas.

Hull and deckhouse structures were also built in modules often upside down so it was all downhand welding, primed and partly outfitted with piping and ducting.
Here its been turned over before lifting onto a barge for shipment round to the shipyard and dry dock. When it was lifted off it would be ready to drop in place on the level below.
There was a real buzz in the shipyard and at the old Westinghouse plant as you could see stuff going together, rather than a mass of people working in close confines trying to do their jobs and being in each others way with flaring tempers.
The first two ships we found the snags and material interferences, corrected them so it was plain sailing after that.
The shipyard could have been building small passenger cargo ships after that but due to a couple of peoples ego's at the top it didn't transpire and they went bankrupt.

 

[taffe65]

WUNDERBAR 👍 👏.
Wise interception regarding placement of the drains tank!

 

[captainconfusion]

After I left the sea I was working at a shipyard in Tampa Florida that were building 5 product tankers for MSC ( Yank RFA), they had single screw Sulzer RNDM 68 engines, new to me.
One of the systems was the CJC sytstem as they called it , which was piston rod lube oil drains into a tank with a pump and fine filter which transferred the oil back to the crankcase.
I know the earlier Sulzers didn't have that nor did Poppet valve B&W's.
Can anybody tell me why this engine had this system?

With other engines scavenge oil drained away to external buckets and the stuffing box kept the crankcase clear of contamination. I cannot see having forced lubrication of the stuffing box as there would be enough oil sloshing about to lubricate the piston rod. I have never come across excessive wear on piston rods, so obviously a well tried and trusted system.

Another strange thing it had was a connection from the LOP to the oil filled stern tube. Now things would be have to be pretty bad to have to purify that oil for mainly water. Cannot say I have ever come across a ship with that system. In fact the stern tube would hold very little oil in the scheme of things. Your lower after ER bulkhead was the start of your stern tube.
I decided to put the LOP on the stern tube and purify the oil, it sucked the outer seals in, so there was something wrong there.
But then this American designed ship was a bit East meets West for somethings such as sounding fuel tanks with sounding tapes( US design) but generators that would start up and go on the board without human interaction ( Norwegian design) plus Saab cargo tank sounding devices using electronics ( Swedish), no local stop/ start for ER pumps particularly lockable stop (American).

At a bit of a loss as a steam man were these engines double acting? 4 stroke cycle or 2 stroke cycle? maybe then I will understand the dreaded contaminated cylinder products of combustion, coming to the stuffing box of the piston rod. The yanks like 4 stroke jobs the europeans 2/stroke and supercharged?

 

[makko]

CC, The Sulzer RD and RND were 2-Stroke single acting cross head engines, the RD having the dreaded rotary exhaust valves. The piston rod scavenge space seal was to avoid contamination between the scavenge space (with detritus from the cylinder) and crankcase. The scavenge space could give good pointers to engine condition generally and was frequently inspected and meticulously cleaned on BF/Ocean vessels. It was always a good idea too to give the engine an occasional blast of revs when slow manoeuvering, to blast the crud out (both RD and RND).

Referring to comments that I have made regarding the Bay Boats, the problem there was that the diesels (RND) which replaced the ST plants were installed at an incline to match the prop shafts. Hence, there was notorious waste oil pooling and scavenge fires were the order of the day, a problem that was insurmountable and accounting for the eventual CTL of one (ex Tokyo Bay, if memory serves).

Rgds.
Dave

 

[Tony the hippy chippy]

CC, The Sulzer RD and RND were 2-Stroke single acting cross head engines, the RD having the dreaded rotary exhaust valves. The piston rod scavenge space seal was to avoid contamination between the scavenge space (with detritus from the cylinder) and crankcase. The scavenge space could give good pointers to engine condition generally and was frequently inspected and meticulously cleaned on BF/Ocean vessels. It was always a good idea too to give the engine an occasional blast of revs when slow manoeuvering, to blast the crud out (both RD and RND).

Referring to comments that I have made regarding the Bay Boats, the problem there was that the diesels (RND) which replaced the ST plants were installed at an incline to match the prop shafts. Hence, there was notorious waste oil pooling and scavenge fires were the order of the day, a problem that was insurmountable and accounting for the eventual CTL of one (ex Tokyo Bay, if memory serves).

Rgds.
Dave

Hi dave only memories of cjc was with maersk anchor handlers they had chart paper inserts I remember they were more easy to clean and regarding Tokyo baythe ship was a death trap,each morning water washing the turbos the fumes were awful with the exhaust leaks infact we were given letters from the chief engineer about this problem incase any health problems acurred I've ended up with ocpd don't know if it was Tokyo bay or my lavish life style rgds tony

 

[Challisstern]

Water washing turbos daily seems a bit excessive on a large two stroke. We used to do it every 5 days on the MAN 4 strokes (as fitted to QE2).

So were these CJC systems peculiar to later Sulzers than the RD.
I cannot see much oil leaking back from the top of the stuffing box to make it worth its while.
But at least we have pulled a few more stories out of the gray matter.

 

[Challisstern]

On a Vee engine or like Mako's inclined Sulzer would you not experience excessive liner wear on one side of the liner?

 

[makko]

On a Vee engine or like Mako's inclined Sulzer would you not experience excessive liner wear on one side of the liner?

Hi dave only memories of cjc was with maersk anchor handlers they had chart paper inserts I remember they were more easy to clean and regarding Tokyo baythe ship was a death trap,each morning water washing the turbos the fumes were awful with the exhaust leaks infact we were given letters from the chief engineer about this problem incase any health problems acurred I've ended up with ocpd don't know if it was Tokyo bay or my lavish life style rgds tony

Water washing turbos daily seems a bit excessive on a large two stroke. We used to do it every 5 days on the MAN 4 strokes (as fitted to QE2).

So were these CJC systems peculiar to later Sulzers than the RD.
I cannot see much oil leaking back from the top of the stuffing box to make it worth its while.
But at least we have pulled a few more stories out of the gray matter.

Inclined LARGE Sulzer - The re-engining was a very bad idea! I managed to escape serving on Bays. As steam ships, they were considered a good berth: Good accom, easy engine room. I know of two engineers who suffered mentally after serving on them!

Ditto, Tony. The very large Sulzers were prone to cracking in the exhaust manifold. On Barber Priam, arriving Yokohama (?), we would be swarmed with Japanese technicians, arriving up the ramp in small contractor's vehicles, loaded with kit and racing into a recently FWE main engine exhaust manifold to reweld. They would don cotton waste on their knees and wear rags over their faces. On one such arrival, I had just removed the bolts from the m'hole cover and they literally pushed past me. We also swapped fuel injectors there, remove complete set and move to workshop, spare set layed out and ready for installation, new set received in the workshop/forklift "bay". The nozzles were simply cut out and new ones installed, the injectors arriving were thus workshop tested and proved in spec. On the RoRo's, the initial problem was in the Exh. BLR on first orders. Sulphuric acid production/condensation wrecked the unit, the Barber Perseus' EXH BLR falling, spectacularly, onto the ME heads! That was one of the reasons for a burst of revs at low speed manoeuvering - Get everything up to temperature and blow the crap out the stack! I never witnessed any birds falling from the sky.......! Barber Perseus also suffered a "runaway" turbocharger incident due to crud. That strengthened the order to do brief speed ups when on low revs/constant engine orders on STBY.

Turbo water wash - Yes, about once a week was the norm, a job for the 4/E, although one 2/E liked doing it himself. The 2/E was also very fond of his "bread" filters in the hot well, located all the way aft. (I, against all odds, got the BLR water within parameters - The lazy previous 4/E had probably not even bothered treating - It was WAY out of spec. I got good kudos from the 2/E and C/E for my efforts!). However, that was on long transits. Coasting USA and even Japan (three ports), it was deemed good practice to wash regularly (see above, re sulphuric acid/crud on low revs!). On one passage, trans-Pacific, we encountered constant fog and had to reduce revs/speed. It became a matter of priority to clean everything out regularly to avoid a possible incident. Re Tony: I can well believe the Tokyo Bay turbos were washed daily - maybe even multiple times! A crock of junk after the re-engining.

Rgds.
Dave

 

[makko]

On a Vee engine or like Mako's inclined Sulzer would you not experience excessive liner wear on one side of the liner?

Hi dave only memories of cjc was with maersk anchor handlers they had chart paper inserts I remember they were more easy to clean and regarding Tokyo baythe ship was a death trap,each morning water washing the turbos the fumes were awful with the exhaust leaks infact we were given letters from the chief engineer about this problem incase any health problems acurred I've ended up with ocpd don't know if it was Tokyo bay or my lavish life style rgds tony

Water washing turbos daily seems a bit excessive on a large two stroke. We used to do it every 5 days on the MAN 4 strokes (as fitted to QE2).

So were these CJC systems peculiar to later Sulzers than the RD.
I cannot see much oil leaking back from the top of the stuffing box to make it worth its while.
But at least we have pulled a few more stories out of the gray matter.

Inclined LARGE Sulzer - The re-engining was a very bad idea! I managed to escape serving on Bays. As steam ships, they were considered a good berth: Good accom, easy engine room. I know of two engineers who suffered mentally after serving on them!

Ditto, Tony. The very large Sulzers were prone to cracking in the exhaust manifold. On Barber Priam, arriving Yokohama (?), we would be swarmed with Japanese technicians, arriving up the ramp in small contractor's vehicles, loaded with kit and racing into a recently FWE main engine exhaust manifold to reweld. They would don cotton waste on their knees and wear rags over their faces. On one such arrival, I had just removed the bolts from the m'hole cover and they literally pushed past me. We also swapped fuel injectors there, remove complete set and move to workshop, spare set layed out and ready for installation, new set received in the workshop/forklift "bay". The nozzles were simply cut out and new ones installed, the injectors arriving were thus workshop tested and proved in spec. On the RoRo's, the initial problem was in the Exh. BLR on first orders. Sulphuric acid production/condensation wrecked the unit, the Barber Perseus' EXH BLR falling, spectacularly, onto the ME heads! That was one of the reasons for a burst of revs at low speed manoeuvering - Get everything up to temperature and blow the crap out the stack! I never witnessed any birds falling from the sky.......! Barber Perseus also suffered a "runaway" turbocharger during low speed/constant engine orders. That reinforced the company memo to do occasional increased revs to blow the crap out of the stack under such cir***stances.

Turbo water wash - Yes, about once a week was the norm, a job for the 4/E, although one 2/E liked doing it himself. The 2/E was also very fond of his "bread" filters in the hot well, located all the way aft. (I, against all odds, got the BLR water within parameters - The lazy previous 4/E had probably not even bothered treating - It was WAY out of spec. I got good kudos from the 2/E and C/E for my efforts!). However, that was on long transits. Coasting USA and even Japan (three ports), it was deemed good practice to wash regularly (see above, re sulphuric acid/crud on low revs!). On one passage, trans-Pacific, we encountered constant fog and had to reduce revs/speed. It became a matter of priority to clean everything out regularly to avoid a possible incident. Re Tony: I can well believe the Tokyo Bay turbos were washed daily - maybe even multiple times! A crock of junk after the re-engining.

Rgds.
Dave

 

[makko]

Ooops! flocking site/compu - I thought that I had lost the post and ended up posting twice. C'est la vie!

Rgds.
Dave

 

[Challisstern]

Dave, they sounded like real hell ships, but no doubt quite sociable, those sort of jobs brings the best out in people.
You don't learn anything when the job is running smoothly.

 

[makko]

Challisstern,

The "prison" ship was HELENUS, A bulker, converted to car carrier, completely clapped out but earned her keep! The Bays were "Chinese Water Torture"! Sorry for the ethnic reference.

Rgds.
Dave

 

[StewartM]

We use CC Jensen CJC filters on ARGYLL FLYER to clean the fuel oil rather than lub oil. Circulates it between the bunker tanks and the daily tank.
Main engines were originally MTU 12V 2000 M70 , now Volvo Penta D16.