Entry & progression
The round is the job. Not the repairs - the repairs are what happens when the round was not done. An engineer who walks the space properly, at the same interval, in the same order, finds faults while they are still cheap.
A round is a systematic inspection of the machinery space using every sense you have. It is not a walk-through. It has an order, it has a route, and the route does not change - because the value of the round is not in what you look at, it is in noticing what has changed since last time. You cannot notice change if you look at different things each time.
Look
- Leaks. Oil, fuel, water, coolant, hydraulic fluid. Any wet patch that was not there last round is a fault, not a mess.
- Levels. Sump oil, coolant header, hydraulic reservoir, gearbox, fuel day tank, bilge.
- Gauges. Oil pressure, coolant temperature, exhaust temperature, battery voltage, load. Read the number, do not just see that the needle exists.
- Bilges. Clean and dry? Any water? Any sheen?
- Belts. Correct tension, no cracking, no black dust below them.
- Colour of the exhaust over the side, and water discharging with it.
Listen
You will learn the sound of the space faster than you expect, and you will hear a change before you can name it. A new knock, a new whine, a bearing starting to sing, the different note of a pump that has lost prime. Take the ear defenders off for two seconds - deliberately, safely - and listen. Then put them back on.
Smell
| Smell | Means |
|---|---|
| Hot oil | Something is running hot, or oil is landing on a hot surface. This is the smell that precedes an engine room fire. |
| Diesel | A leak. Find it. Diesel in a bilge is a fire load and a slip hazard. |
| Petrol | An emergency. Ventilate, isolate ignition sources, find it. |
| Burning / acrid electrical | Overheating insulation. Somewhere, a connection is cooking. |
| Rotten egg | Batteries being overcharged. |
| Exhaust | A leak in the exhaust system. That is carbon monoxide, and it is odourless - what you smell is the rest of the exhaust telling you the CO is there too. |
Touch - carefully
Back of the hand, never the palm. If the surface is hotter than you expect, the reflex closes your palm around it. The back of the hand pulls away. Feel for vibration that was not there, for a bearing housing that is hot, for a cable or a breaker that is warm. Do not touch anything rotating, and do not touch anything you have not first looked at.
WARNING — Never go into a machinery space alone without telling someone It is hot, noisy, full of moving machinery, and nobody can hear you shout. If you go below, someone on the bridge knows where you are and when you are due back.
That is not bureaucracy. It is the only mechanism by which anyone finds out you are hurt.
Do the same round, every time
A workable routine
- Start at the same place - typically the main engine - and follow the same physical route every round.
- Read and write down every gauge, not just the ones you are worried about.
- Finish at the bilges and the electrical panel, which are the two places most likely to be quietly getting worse.
- Log it. A round that is not written down did not happen, and cannot show a trend.
- Report anything that changed - even if you fixed it. Especially if you fixed it.