JOSUE FABRIS

CA limiter map adjustment

Order no : 11140448
SWR no : SWR-000320634
Work started : 19.9.2021
Work ended : 19.9.2021
Work location : Itacoatiara-AM, Brasil
Performed by : Leonardo Barbosa

Reported by : Leonardo Barbosa

Report date : 20.9.2021
Table of contents
Disclaimer 3
Order 3
Scope of work 4
Spare parts 4
Engine details and running hours 4
1 Background 5
2 Description of work 5
3 Recommendations 5
4 Site safety 5
5 Calibrated measuring devices utilized 5
6 Conclusions 5
Attachments 6

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Service Work Report
JOSUE FABRIS - SWR-000320634 - CA limiter map adjustment

Disclaimer
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No part of this publication may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, graphic, photocopying, recording, taping or
other information retrieval systems) without the prior written permission of the copyright holder. Wärtsilä makes no representation, warranty (express or
implied) in this publication and assumes no responsibility for the correctness, errors or omissions for information contained herein. Information in this
publication is subject to change without notice.

Unless otherwise expressly set forth, no recommendation contained in this document is to be constructed as provided due to a defect in the
product, but merely as an improvement of the product and/or the maintenance procedures relating here to. Any actions by the owner/operator as
a result of the recommendation are not covered under any warranty provided by Wärtsilä and such actions will thus be at the owner's/operator's
own cost and expense.

NO LIABILITY WHETHER DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL, IS ASSUMED WITH RESPECT TO THE INFORMATION
CONTAINED HEREIN. THIS PUBLICATION IS CONFIDENTIAL AND INTENDED FOR INFORMATION PURPOSES ONLY.

Order
Order no: Customer P.O. no:
11140448 PO 4501148380

Order by: Installation:

Hermasa Navegação da
Amazônia Ltda JOSUE FABRIS

Order date: Work dates:

20/09/21 From 19.9.2021 to 19.9.2021

Customer contact: Performed by:

Lucas Neves Leonardo Barbosa

Internal order by: Location:

Marcelo Moraes Itacoatiara-AM, Brasil

FS Coordinator: IMO Number:

Marcelo Moraes

Site: Product reference type:

At sea (within port limit) W20

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Scope of work
Item Description Specific information
0010 Verificação do Sistema
de Automação

Spare parts
Item no SPN Description Quantity Engine Product no
type

Engine details and running hours

Engine # Nickname Engine Nominal Nominal Rotation Running Date
type speed power direction hours
(rpm) (kW)
PAAE274580 PS W6L20 1000 1200 CCW 20800 20.09.2021
PAAE274581 STB W6L20 1000 1200 CCW 20800 20.09.2021

Engine No Running hours

HFO LFO GAS Total

Characteristics of:
Fuel oil Lubrication oil supplier
Density kg/l Brand
Viscosity cSt TBN
Temp bEngine ºC Sample
CCAI Syst. Vol m3

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1 Background
Wartsila was requested to correct engine acceleration problems and heavy black smoke
generation during load transients, such as clutch engagement.
Crew reported black smoke emission during maneuvers, engine high temperatures and sometimes
engine acceleration problems.
Josué Fabris engines operation, just as the whole fleet, was recently changed from HFO to MDO,
which can be seeing as the start point of the problems reported.

2 Description of work
Introduction
Most of the time, heavy black smoke emission on Diesel engines is related to the rapid increase in
fuel amount injected into the combustion chamber during sudden load changes in the attempt to
recover speed, such as clutch in for example.
Basically the speed controller will react to the engine speed drop and will use whatever is available
of fuel injection to return as fast as possible to the setpoint speed, hence the need of charge air
based fuel limiters to avoid excessive fuel injection specially at low loads where CA pressure is not
yet built.
Smoke seen on exhaust pipes can among other factors be translated as incomplete combustion,
hence the excessive fuel that was not matched to air for a complete combustion is just exhausted to
the atmosphere as fuel products residues.
With fuel limiter adjusted, the speed control system will always refer to the maximum allowed fuel
injection for a given CA pressure. Max fuel allowance will vary according to PT601 feedback (Charge
air pressure).
Always remember that TC is a lot slower in response when compared to pumps fuel injection,
which is almost instant.
Important to highlight that these fuel limiters are normally adjusted during commissioning
considering that fuel pumps, injection valves and CA system (Turbocharger and CA cooler) are in
good condition. The degradation of those components, may lead in time to an unresponsive
engine, as pumps elements are wearing out along with fuel nozzles, which will require a larger
amount of fuel injection percentage provided that part of that fuel injected will never reach the
combustion chamber.
In the above scenario normally another CA limiter adjustment would be required and engine would
be able to respond again, but that would not eliminate the need for pumps and nozzles overhauling,
which should be the first line of action.

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Changes from HFO to MDO

It is known that the use of HFO on diesel engines can cause faster wearing of fuel pumps
elements, turbo charger and injection nozzles, specially when this engines are constantly running with
no load at harbor or in low load conditions.

Figure 1 - Recommendations to engine operation

Consider that HFO impurities, sulphur and water content and other particles can cause pump
elements to wear faster if compared MDO operation. But due to the nature of this type of fuel (HFO),
which operates with viscosity levels between 16 to 24 cSt, fuel losses on the fuel pump are less likely
than when engine is operated with MDO/LFO which has naturally a lower viscosity (around 2 - 4 cSt).
Hermasa fleet has been operating on HFO for quite a long time, which probably caused a lot of
wear on fuel pump elements. MDO through a warn out pump, is partially lost at pump element,
requiring thereafter a higher pump index in order to deliver the same amount of energy on the
cylinder, on top of the fact that MDO has a lower heating value when compared to HFO, which by
itself would already require an increased pump index to maintain the same engine output.
Considering the explanation given on the introduction of this report, the wearing of pump elements
caused over time, added to a change from HFO to MDO operation, it is clear that CA limiter Map
once adjusted to limit fuel injection according to CA pressure, is no longer valid, causing therefore
acceleration problems.
Another important detail is the engine loading capability. Propulsion system on these tug pushers
does not use a speed rate limiter or a loading program, hence engine load increase is subjected to
how fast engine speed command will be given by the bridge.
Engine controller is able to control analogue speed rate so that engine speed and load is not
increased on higher rates than engine design and specifications. However, this will mostly cause slow
tug maneuverability as engine speed and load will take a long time to respond.
See below recommended loading capacity for Wartsila 20 engines that can be moderated by the
bridge whenever possible for a best performance and least fuel consumption.

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When arriving to the installation, GT165 was again adjusted and load estimation map corrected
with Test Records data for a better load calculation and more precise VIC operation.
It was noticed that fuel pump indexes would differ around 3 to 4 mm from each other on Starboard
engine and about 2 to 3 mm on port side engine.
Injection pumps where fuel indexes were advanced (increased manually) can clearly indicate pump
element wear. This is a compensation of fuel internal leakage at pumps, now that engines are
operating with a lower viscosity fuel.
When disconnecting clean fuel lines from pumps, it was possible to see most of them dripping fuel
or actually with a constant leak stream.
Another indication is the difficulties found to start the engines even with Start Fuel limiter at 100%.
Starboard engine could only be started if fuel racks were moved manually with full complete injection.
This can also indicate heavy wear on pump elements.
It was also noticed that both engines needed a quite high actuator output just to run disengaged on
idle mode.
On port side engine, about 26% of actuator output (CV 161), corresponding to 12mm fuel injection
was necessary just for idle running (no load) whilst starboard engine needed incredibly 37%,
corresponding to 16,2mm fuel injection just for idle running. See below:

Figure 2 - Port Engine idle running

Figure 3 - Starboard Engine idle running

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Such a high injection for just idle running, also indicates pump wear specially adding to the fact that
both engines presented clean fuel leakage alarm. Collecting tubes from double wall pipe were
removed from the hot box manifold and no leakage was identified on those, only on the lines coming
from the pumps and injection valve. W6L20 engines would normally have a maximum clean fuel
leak of 5,0Kg/h at 100% load.

Figure 4 - Clean fuel oil leakage alarm

Another important fact is fuel specific energy content (amount of energy per mass of fuel) . A
bad quality fuel or with high water content will demand a lot more pump fuel injection in order to
provide the required engine output. This is will translate into high consumption and limited engine
loading capacity, just as observed on the tests. Fuel Oil samples as close as possible to engine inlet
will indicate the current condition of the product in use.

CA Limiter Adjustment and engine trials

Despite all indications that fuel pump elements were warn out, it was slightly adjusted CA limiters
to avoid some of the black smoke generated during clutch and load transients.
It was possible to reduce smoke emission considerably on both engines, with a better result on PS
engine which had better fuel pump conditions when compared to STB engine.
During trials, PS engine was able to reach 95% load with 29 mm fuel injection, but still with high TC
inlet temperature, while STB engine had constant exhaust temperature alarms on all cylinders when
submitted to same speed as portside engine (950rpm)
For starboard engine to be able to reach 950 rpm under load conditions (pushing a loaded barge),
it was necessary 33mm of fuel injection (maximum on Test Records for 100% load was 30mm).
Also its worth mentioning that starboard engine CA pressure is about 0,8 bar lower when
compared to test records and 0,3bar lower when compared to portside engine at same TC speed.
See below the details for both engines running at 940 to 950 rpm with tug pusher attached to a
loaded barge.
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Figure 5 - Starboard engine with 40.000 rpm TC speed and 2.59 bar CA - 945rpm engine speed

Figure 6 - Comparison with similar TC speed during Test Records for PAAE274581

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Figure 7 - Starboard engine with 40.000 rpm TC speed and 2.89 bar CA - 950rpm engine speed

Figure 8 - Comparison with similar TC speed during Test Records for PAAE274580

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Note that high temperatures on exhaust gas system might be related to lack of CA pressure,
specially on STB engine which is much lower even when compared to PS engine, not to mention test
records.
High TC inlet temperatures can also be related to high back pressure over the exhaust pipe
system. See details below:

SPEED SENSOR FOR ESM

As informed on the last service report, ESM (Engine safety module) needs to detect engine speed
pulse corresponding to engine running level (around 400 rpm) in order to enable LO shutdown and
HT water shutdown (When enabled. Many engines will only request load reduction upon high HT
water temperature).
This speed pulse is generated at ST174 and ST173 sensors, which are working in parallel with
signal redundancy (the highest signal will always be used).
These sensors are used to enable safeties on ESM, give engine running status to ESM, start hour
counter (running hours) and mainly to detect and protect the engine in case of overspeed (115% of
nominal speed).
Port side engine had both sensors damaged, hence this engine has been running without ANY
PROTECTION for low lube oil pressure and overspeed.
Two sensors were removed from Arlindo Cavalca and installed on Port side engine of Josué
Fabris, however only one sensor was in order. With at least one sensor working, Lube oil low
pressure shutdown, hour counter and overspeed will work normally
Lube oil shutdown and overspeed on channels 1 and 2 were tested on Port side engine. On
channel 1 it was found that the speed pick frequency configured for nominal speed was set wrong at
1000Hz (maybe confused with 1000 rpm). This was corrected to 516,7Hz as specifications for this
engine and overspeed test was successfully accomplished.
On STB engine also only one speed sensor was working (ST 173). After some quick verifications,
it was found that ST174 sensor is in good order, but channel 2 (X14: 1, 2 and 3) on ESM is not
working. A new ESM is required to solve the problem with the second speed sensor ST174.

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3 Recommendations
Considering all observations and tests it is highly recommended that:

 Fuel pump elements are replaced as soon as possible;

 Fuel injection valves to be checked for its condition and correct opening pressure (450 bar
+/-10)

 CA coolers are cleaned and differential pressure measured for the records;

 Fuel oil coolers are supposed to maintain FO temperature below 45 degrees Celsius.

 TC cleaning and overhaul if necessary

 Wartsila engineer to be requested again when all items related to fuel injection and charge air
system are solved.

 A new ESM is required for STB engine due to speed sensor channel 2 malfunctioning.
It was also noticed that lube oil filter differential pressure is already as high as 1,0 bar. Note that at
2,0 bar level, filtering elements will be bypassed for safety, allowing some bigger particles to enter
engine system.
New filtering elements on the automatic filter are to be acquired and replaced as soon as possible.
At least ONE speed sensor (ST 174 and ST173) should be working in order to have engine
safeties on operation. In case hour counter is not working and engine speed on engine panel is not
displayed, both speed sensors are not working and engine is therefore not protected.

4 Site safety
Incident name Incident Incident Work Activity Incident WeCare
type date stopped name summary case ref
due
incident?

5 Calibrated measuring devices utilized

Tool/gauge Identification number

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6 Conclusions
Engine fuel recent change from HFO to MDO has brought to light several problems on the fuel
injection system and CA system that need to be solved for a better engine performance and smoke
control/ acceleration control calibration.
Once all conditions are properly met, Wartsila engineer can again come to site to perform all
adjustments for CA limiter maps. All items combined will result in reduced wearing of components
and better fuel efficiency for the engines, saving a lot of resources with maintenance, time and fuel
costs.
During tests, it was clear that both engines need pumps overhauling, and complete check on the
fuel system and CA system, not to mention lube oil automatic system and finally a automation
adjustment for speed/load and smoke control.
Despite all facts mentioned on this report, smoke emissions were considerably reduced during this
attendance and acceleration control was revised and tested successfully. Wartsila intervention and
tests were closely witnessed and promptly assisted by Chief Engineer and Hermasa Maintenance
representative at all times.
Engines were left under normal operation and no open or outstanding issues/ restrictions for
engine operation were left other than the recommendations here exposed.

Attachments

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