Power Relays – The Electromagnetic Switches

The major plight of doubts for Engineer officers onboard a merchant ship is to tackle with electrical problems which, for most, go beyond the understanding.  It’s not always practical to look forward to the presence of Electrical Engineer to solve the minutest of these. It’s imperative for an engineer to understand the basic and simple understanding of the most common parts of an electrical circuit to head-start the fault finding in correct direction.

Power Relays – The Electromagnetic Switches

Ballast Water Management – Guarding the Bio-invasion

Ballast water is filled into the ballast tanks of the ships to maintain stability and improve the handling and manoeuvrability of the ship. Ballasting maintains a safe operating condition throughout the voyage by reducing hull stress, improving propulsion and, in the meantime, also compensating for any weight change in various scenarios of fuel and water consumption. Pumping in the sea water to be used as ballast is the most economical practice with the above mentioned advantages but it comes at a cost.

Ballast Water Management

Trails of a Lone Rider - Rajasthan calling

We travel not to escape life, but for life not to escape us

Prologue

1st September 2017
My phone has been silent since today morning. No calls, messages or notifications received. That’s quite unusual. 
Seems to me the Silence before the Storm

1800 hrs.
Phone sprangs to life:    (tring tring), (tring tring)
Notification:                    1 Message received
Message:                        Hi Mr. Prateek. You will be required to join onboard ship MT Kourion, around the second week of the next month(0ctober 2017). Please prepare yourself accordingly. Wish you a Happy Sailing.

Far from the Madding Crowd

The Way We Spend Our Times Defines Who We Are

              Relaxing in the arms of nature, a sense of solitude, yet, completeness has always endured me. In the busy and fast paced life, lucky are those who chance upon solitude. With the tag of being social and being connected pressurising even the remotest of cavemen, at times, the soul needs to be unchained. Away from this chaos, into the thoughts, an unending self-realisation is my dose for revival.

Photologue - 600 Kms of SoloRide to Nilgiris on RE Thunderbird.

Journeys are measured not in Distance but in Memories.

Coming home after a sail of 7 months is hell of a relief. And none understands the feeling of homecoming better than us.

After a month long stay at home, when it started feeling a bit monotonous.I planned for something adventurous. 
A bike trip to pump up some adrenaline, was what, I was looking for.....

At Lovedale Toy Train Station

Demystifying The Isolated and Earthed Neutral System

The function of an electrical system is to safely convey the power from the source to the various consumer equipment connected to it. A ship's electrical system can take any of the two forms:

• Neutral Insulated system, or

• Neutral Earthed system.

Ship Electrical System

Cold Ironing - Plugging the Gap in Greener Shipping Industry

Cold Ironing - The practise of providing power to a ship from shore, when she is in port, to enable the ship to shut down the diesel grunting auxiliary generators. 

Cold Ironing - Alternative Shore Power

Flammability Diagram - Importance in Cargo Operations

Fire hazard during a tank operation in vessels poses a major risk to the seafaring community. In this discussion:  Flammability Diagram and it's understanding.

Tanker Fire Hazard

A sad day in Indian History - Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam Passes Away

27 July, 2015

This has to mark the end of an era. His presence, His thoughts and His sayings, can never be revived. The Great great Bharat Ratna Dr. Kalam left us, leaving his footsteps for us to follow.

A void that can hardly be filled. 

A scientist, A Poet,A Writer,A Singer and above all An Ignitor of millions of souls, will be missed by all.

His actions and words will stay in our heart and mind for years to follow.

We pledge on this day to define our actions for the cause of seeing The Vision of , The most Cherished and Lovable Person.

Bharat Ratna Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam bids his Farewell

Offshore Wind Farms

The growth of wind power in Europe is running out of space. Logically, the next step is to develop offshore wind farms at sea.

Offshore Wind Farms

Automatic Backflushing Filters

AUTOMATIC BACKFLUSH FILTER

Presenting a latest Innovation in filtration method used onboard for both fuel and lube oil.Used in conjunction with a centrifugal separator as part of a complete lubricating oil system or fuel oil treatment system, the Automatic Backflush filters effectively separate impurities, according to size.Continuous backflushing helps prevent adhesion of retained solids to filter surfaces. This ensures long service intervals and drastically reduces the costs for manual cleaning, filter replacement and filter disposal.

Engine Rocking and Use of Bracing Units

When highly powered marine diesel engines run, they produce vibrations which may resonate with vibrations of other machinery and cause heavy damage to ship structure as well as machinery.

When the engine is running it experiences longitudinal(athwartship) as well as transverse(fore-aft) vibrations. 

Bracing or Rocking is particularly concerned with the longitudinal or athwartship vibration of the engine.

Use of Concentric Spring in Auxiliary Engine Valve Arrangement.

There is a slight misconception among students regarding this topic. Usually it seems obvious that the use of two springs gives additional safety in case of failure of one. But wait !! Well that may be a one reason for it, the primary reason for use of two springs is different.

1. If one would look carefully, it is noticed that the two springs have their coil in opposite direction.One is right handed and other left handed. This is important since when the springs compress and decompress at high speed , there is a side thrust acting on the spring retainer due to coils of spring. To cancel this side thrust, another spring with opposite coil direction is introduced. Since the side thrust from second spring is opposite to that of first spring, the net side thrust is zero. 

2. There is the effect of resonance at high engine speed. To prevent the matching of natural frequency of the running engine to the natural frequency of the spring, additional spring is added. This addition increases the natural frequency of the spring combination much higher than the engine's natural frequency, thus preventing any damage to the engine by excessive amplitude of vibration. 

3. Lastly, two spring do provides an additional safety in case of failure of one. But remember this is not the primary reason for use of two.

Rudder Angle Onboard Ship Limited to 35°

The maximum angle upto which the rudder of a ship can turn is limited to 35 degrees. The discussion throws light on the reasons behind it.

About Mariner's Digest

Ahoy Fellas,
Submitting my benevolent thanks for visiting the page.

With ever changing and demanding technical jobs required to be carried onboard merchant vessels, there would be an immediate need for skilled engineers onboard mighty vessels to take care of their power-packs.

At Mariner's Digest, lets take a step to get closer to the king-size concepts and explanations behind the working and maintenance of these giants. Though a startup, this blog will try to put in front of you logic in a simple and easy to understand language, from a student perspective.

The posts, in Mariner's Digest, not only provides valuable information to marine engineers but also looks for those enthusiasts out there, who have the irrevocable question : How it Works?

Since Marine Engineering is a specific field where the pursuers are required to have a practical approach rather than theoretical. Touching almost all the engineering topics; basics of a computer to entry level management to concepts of Refrigeration to ... . Of course don't miss out the Diesel Engines, for it is the bread and butter for marine engineers.