# Doxford Reflections



## Tim Gibbs

I had thought that the majority of my sea time was spent with LB Doxfords but looking back into my discharge book I realise that was not the case – it just seemed that way ‘cos lots of “stuff” happen during those times!
The Doxford engine, with its uniflow scavenging and constant pressure fuel injection, certainly had the best fuel consumption of its time and, with no combustion loads transmitted to the structure, were relatively vibration free but …… it was so mechanically complicated!
Main bearings was in a spherical pocket, and each unit had two pistons and so many bearings; three bottom end bearings in spherical housings, three crosshead bearings and slippers, two side rod bearings and a big centre bearing in the transverse beam.
Despite this, the engines up to 670mm bore seemed to run quite well but, of course, the number of components resulted in a large maintenance load compared with single piston engines even when they were running well.
For my sins most of my time was spent with 75LB6 engines and because I didn’t know much different I didn’t realise at the time how bad they were. I think there were only 12 of this size built and our company had six of them and I sailed on 4 of those.
Before they were 4 years old, all our engines had to have new crankshafts due to a design defect. However, they still had a weakness in that No 3 forward and No 4 aft crankwebs were highly stressed at the internal fillet with the adjacent main journal. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the ships themselves were very flexible and resulted in having to be careful with crankshaft alignment and I became quite proficient at threading a piano wire through the engine and the aft engine room bulkhead to the aft peak bulkhead. However that didn’t stop us finding a large fracture in No.4 on one ship and having carried out a sort of repair sailed back to the UK to discover another fracture at No3 as the engine was being dismantled to receive it’s third crankshaft in 12 years.
All these engines kept the likes of Andrews Master Hones and Golten Marine in business machining our journals and pins in situ as we had numerous bearing failures. For reasons I can’t remember we has several failures of bottom end bearings resulting from the white metal breaking up like crazy paving. Other failures probably resulted from locked sphericals and dirt and water contaminated lube oil. 
Being non-diaphragm engines it was a battle to keep the oil clean, not helped by high piston ring and liner wear rates, so we fitted larger bottom piston scraper drains and run purifiers continuously and injected trisodiumphosphate to decrease the acidity . 
Water contamination was a problem because the bottom piston cooling water system, in addition to the usual gland problems, also suffered for severe erosion and despite setting off with lots of elbows and pipes, there never seem to be enough.
As a consequence of dirty, wet oil we ended up with a very severe microbial attack on one ship and a lesser attack on another that resulted in more profits for the in situ machiners and the airlines flying crosshead pins back to the UK for microfinishing. 
This size engine also seemed to suffer for disproportionally high were rates with the transverse pin bearings compare with the smaller bore engines. I wonder if this had anything to do with the exceptional flexibility of the crankshaft? We had a good example of this with the engine with the fractured crasnkshaft; a large steel strap has been fitted around the crankweb and we had to cut a bit of the bedplate away to allow it to rotate. However when we started the engine we found the strap was fouling the bedplate despite there being ample clearance in the static condition!
There were many more issues but I don’t remember feeling bad about them – in my ignorance I just thought that was the way of things when you went to sea as an engineer in the '60s. But then I did my “steam time”………….. and my eyes were opened!


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## OilJiver

Tim Gibbs said:


> ….... But then I did my “steam time”………….. and my eyes were opened!


…..Even in the glare of all those brilliant white boilersuits…..!



(V interesting post btw. Many thanks)


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## sternchallis

OilJiver said:


> …..Even in the glare of all those brilliant white boilersuits…..!
> 
> 
> 
> (V interesting post btw. Many thanks)


Not for long though.


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## saudisid

Tim Gibbs said:


> I had thought that the majority of my sea time was spent with LB Doxfords but looking back into my discharge book I realise that was not the case – it just seemed that way ‘cos lots of “stuff” happen during those times!
> The Doxford engine, with its uniflow scavenging and constant pressure fuel injection, certainly had the best fuel consumption of its time and, with no combustion loads transmitted to the structure, were relatively vibration free but …… it was so mechanically complicated!
> Main bearings was in a spherical pocket, and each unit had two pistons and so many bearings; three bottom end bearings in spherical housings, three crosshead bearings and slippers, two side rod bearings and a big centre bearing in the transverse beam.
> Despite this, the engines up to 670mm bore seemed to run quite well but, of course, the number of components resulted in a large maintenance load compared with single piston engines even when they were running well.
> For my sins most of my time was spent with 75LB6 engines and because I didn’t know much different I didn’t realise at the time how bad they were. I think there were only 12 of this size built and our company had six of them and I sailed on 4 of those.
> Before they were 4 years old, all our engines had to have new crankshafts due to a design defect. However, they still had a weakness in that No 3 forward and No 4 aft crankwebs were highly stressed at the internal fillet with the adjacent main journal. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the ships themselves were very flexible and resulted in having to be careful with crankshaft alignment and I became quite proficient at threading a piano wire through the engine and the aft engine room bulkhead to the aft peak bulkhead. However that didn’t stop us finding a large fracture in No.4 on one ship and having carried out a sort of repair sailed back to the UK to discover another fracture at No3 as the engine was being dismantled to receive it’s third crankshaft in 12 years.
> All these engines kept the likes of Andrews Master Hones and Golten Marine in business machining our journals and pins in situ as we had numerous bearing failures. For reasons I can’t remember we has several failures of bottom end bearings resulting from the white metal breaking up like crazy paving. Other failures probably resulted from locked sphericals and dirt and water contaminated lube oil.
> Being non-diaphragm engines it was a battle to keep the oil clean, not helped by high piston ring and liner wear rates, so we fitted larger bottom piston scraper drains and run purifiers continuously and injected trisodiumphosphate to decrease the acidity .
> Water contamination was a problem because the bottom piston cooling water system, in addition to the usual gland problems, also suffered for severe erosion and despite setting off with lots of elbows and pipes, there never seem to be enough.
> As a consequence of dirty, wet oil we ended up with a very severe microbial attack on one ship and a lesser attack on another that resulted in more profits for the in situ machiners and the airlines flying crosshead pins back to the UK for microfinishing.
> This size engine also seemed to suffer for disproportionally high were rates with the transverse pin bearings compare with the smaller bore engines. I wonder if this had anything to do with the exceptional flexibility of the crankshaft? We had a good example of this with the engine with the fractured crasnkshaft; a large steel strap has been fitted around the crankweb and we had to cut a bit of the bedplate away to allow it to rotate. However when we started the engine we found the strap was fouling the bedplate despite there being ample clearance in the static condition!
> There were many more issues but I don’t remember feeling bad about them – in my ignorance I just thought that was the way of things when you went to sea as an engineer in the '60s. But then I did my “steam time”………….. and my eyes were opened!


Tim
Would you be talking about the Ripon class when you say the company had 6.
I did 3 trips as Cadet in the Ripon and first trip Third Mate in her.

Alan


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## Tim Gibbs

saudisid said:


> Tim
> Would you be talking about the Ripon class when you say the company had 6.
> I did 3 trips as Cadet in the Ripon and first trip Third Mate in her.
> 
> Alan


Yes Alan, it was that class and she was my first 75LB6 Doxford. I sailed as Engineer Cadet on her in 1962 (my God , that's over half a century ago!). Apart from a 24 hours stoppage in the Red Sea I don't recall much else about her although I have this silly idea that the GA drawing in the alleyway said the funnel was 49'10" high . Could that possibly be true ?!
Next up was the ' Newcastle, my first 2/E job and not many fond memories of her and certainly none regarding trying to sort out a serious problem with No.4 main bearing prior to her being sold to Ben Line in 1968.
That was soon followed by the fateful trip on the 'Colombo when we found the crankshaft fractured and I subsequently stood-by her in Sunderland whilst the the crankshaft was being replaced. 
My first C/E job was the 'Winnipeg of which I have few memories but I have many memories of my last trips to sea - back to the dreaded 'Colombo for a couple Canada - India trips.
The class association didn't end there as I had the 'Colombo & 'Newcastle as two of my ships as a Superintendent. It seems that, like the poor, they are always with you (A)


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## Tim Gibbs

..... I think there were only 12 of this size built and our company had six of them and I sailed on 4 of those.....
[/QUOTE said:


> I'm may be wrong about there being only 12 built as, in addition to the ones I knew about, a friend of my mine told me the other day that he was almost certain NZS had some. Can anyone confirm that ?


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## csturnbull

Interesting stuff, takes me back to my Elder Dempster days over fifty years ago, nearly all Doxfords with the odd one or two B&W's. I have just been looking at the old Port Sydney on YouTube but I cannot remember what the small wheel was for on the left of the controls!! Time to book into the Old Peoples Home I think!!
Can anyone refresh an old brain??
Cheers
Cliff


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## dannic

csturnbull said:


> Interesting stuff, takes me back to my Elder Dempster days over fifty years ago, nearly all Doxfords with the odd one or two B&W's. I have just been looking at the old Port Sydney on YouTube but I cannot remember what the small wheel was for on the left of the controls!! Time to book into the Old Peoples Home I think!!
> Can anyone refresh an old brain??
> Cheers
> Cliff


Fuel pressure, after starting you had to keep fuel pressure up at 600 psi range. 
Dannic.


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## dannic

Tim Gibbs said:


> I had thought that the majority of my sea time was spent with LB Doxfords but looking back into my discharge book I realise that was not the case – it just seemed that way ‘cos lots of “stuff” happen during those times!
> The Doxford engine, with its uniflow scavenging and constant pressure fuel injection, certainly had the best fuel consumption of its time and, with no combustion loads transmitted to the structure, were relatively vibration free but …… it was so mechanically complicated!
> Main bearings was in a spherical pocket, and each unit had two pistons and so many bearings; three bottom end bearings in spherical housings, three crosshead bearings and slippers, two side rod bearings and a big centre bearing in the transverse beam.
> Despite this, the engines up to 670mm bore seemed to run quite well but, of course, the number of components resulted in a large maintenance load compared with single piston engines even when they were running well.
> For my sins most of my time was spent with 75LB6 engines and because I didn’t know much different I didn’t realise at the time how bad they were. I think there were only 12 of this size built and our company had six of them and I sailed on 4 of those.
> Before they were 4 years old, all our engines had to have new crankshafts due to a design defect. However, they still had a weakness in that No 3 forward and No 4 aft crankwebs were highly stressed at the internal fillet with the adjacent main journal. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the ships themselves were very flexible and resulted in having to be careful with crankshaft alignment and I became quite proficient at threading a piano wire through the engine and the aft engine room bulkhead to the aft peak bulkhead. However that didn’t stop us finding a large fracture in No.4 on one ship and having carried out a sort of repair sailed back to the UK to discover another fracture at No3 as the engine was being dismantled to receive it’s third crankshaft in 12 years.
> All these engines kept the likes of Andrews Master Hones and Golten Marine in business machining our journals and pins in situ as we had numerous bearing failures. For reasons I can’t remember we has several failures of bottom end bearings resulting from the white metal breaking up like crazy paving. Other failures probably resulted from locked sphericals and dirt and water contaminated lube oil.
> Being non-diaphragm engines it was a battle to keep the oil clean, not helped by high piston ring and liner wear rates, so we fitted larger bottom piston scraper drains and run purifiers continuously and injected trisodiumphosphate to decrease the acidity .
> Water contamination was a problem because the bottom piston cooling water system, in addition to the usual gland problems, also suffered for severe erosion and despite setting off with lots of elbows and pipes, there never seem to be enough.
> As a consequence of dirty, wet oil we ended up with a very severe microbial attack on one ship and a lesser attack on another that resulted in more profits for the in situ machiners and the airlines flying crosshead pins back to the UK for microfinishing.
> This size engine also seemed to suffer for disproportionally high were rates with the transverse pin bearings compare with the smaller bore engines. I wonder if this had anything to do with the exceptional flexibility of the crankshaft? We had a good example of this with the engine with the fractured crasnkshaft; a large steel strap has been fitted around the crankweb and we had to cut a bit of the bedplate away to allow it to rotate. However when we started the engine we found the strap was fouling the bedplate despite there being ample clearance in the static condition!
> There were many more issues but I don’t remember feeling bad about them – in my ignorance I just thought that was the way of things when you went to sea as an engineer in the '60s. But then I did my “steam time”………….. and my eyes were opened!


Trisodiumphosphate? we used that as cooling water treatment!!
Dannic.


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## spongebob

Trisodium phosphate , a strong alkaline has many uses , even in some food stuffs , but we used it at Babcock as a initial boil out additive to the boiler water when first firing after construction to ensure all heat exchange surfaces were absolutely clear of any contamination especially grease and oil etc .
Came the day when we were commissions a new packaged Steambloc fire tube boiler at the Air New Zealand workshops at Auckland airport.
The burner cut out had been set to shut off the fire at just above 50 lbs/sq inch 
But the fact was that the steam safety valve, normally tested and set at 155 Psi was slackened back to about 45 psi.
Bang off she went spraying highly corrosive steam and water over the staff car park. Thank God for an easterly wind , had it been a prevailing westerly we would have doused a whole Douglas DC10 over its aluminium hull which might have desolved before our eyes.
Insurance covered us but the payout was huge as every man and his dog made a claim for even the slightest damage to their cars,
The one I fell sorry for was the young typist with a brand new pumpkin coloured Fiat 500, the body work paint was right off.
Well Off thread but a memory brought on by Doxford stories!

Bob


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## Engine Serang

dannic said:


> Fuel pressure, after starting you had to keep fuel pressure up at 600 psi range.
> Dannic.


I have a recollection that on the Regent Falcon it was 6000 psi.

Perhaps I should also check out an old Peoples Home.


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## csturnbull

Of course!! Easy when someone tells you!! Many thanks.


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## csturnbull

Engine Serang said:


> I have a recollection that on the Regent Falcon it was 6000 psi.
> 
> Perhaps I should also check out an old Peoples Home.


Maybe it was 6000psi. I know the start air was 600psi. Racking the old grey matter once again!!


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## Tim Gibbs

dannic said:


> Trisodiumphosphate? we used that as cooling water treatment!!
> Dannic.


Interestingly, we also found that the TSP injection considerably increase the amount of crap removed by the centrifuges


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## sternchallis

spongebob said:


> Trisodium phosphate , a strong alkaline has many uses , even in some food stuffs , but we used it at Babcock as a initial boil out additive to the boiler water when first firing after construction to ensure all heat exchange surfaces were absolutely clear of any contamination especially grease and oil etc .
> The one I fell sorry for was the young typist with a brand new pumpkin coloured Fiat 500, the body work paint was right off.
> 
> Bob


As Sub Ltn't Phillips would have said, " Oooooo Narsty" ' Left hand down a bit '.

Just looked up in my copy of Southern's Marine Oil Engines,
during manoevring keep pressure at 6000lb/ in 2, never let fall below 4000 psi.

That TSP gave a yellow tinge to the cooling water on our ships.


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## Brian Dobbie

I seem to remember the mechanical fuel injectors, the type with the cage over the nozzle assembly.
They would regularly jam open when the engine was stopped and fuel pressure 6000psi to zero instantly. Then an Engineer running round the middles with the fork to close and isolate the defective injector. Sometimes the relief valve would lift at next start due to fuel in the cylinder.
All in all not my favourite engine.
My last ship was a Wartsila Rt.Flex and they have gone to common rail with a large fuel ac***ulator but no priming pump.


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## Duncan112

Was the yellow stuff not Potassium Chromate? IIRC you were not meant to use it in systems with a jacket evaporator for potable water as it was poisonous. I only used Nitrate based ones, but the Chromate was also used as an indicator in Nitrate titrations for Chloride contamination.


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## sternchallis

Brian Dobbie said:


> I seem to remember the mechanical fuel injectors, the type with the cage over the nozzle assembly.
> They would regularly jam open when the engine was stopped and fuel pressure 6000psi to zero instantly. Then an Engineer running round the middles with the fork to close and isolate the defective injector. Sometimes the relief valve would lift at next start due to fuel in the cylinder.
> All in all not my favourite engine.
> My last ship was a Wartsila Rt.Flex and they have gone to common rail with a large fuel ac***ulator but no priming pump.


Would that be AB Dobbie, known for scooping up 45 gallon of HFO and pouring it down a fuel vent, that suddenly appeared overnight as deck cargo on a former Strick Line ship known for these antics because of a design fault, circa 1982.


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## sternchallis

Potassium Chromate , sounds familiar as well, could well have been that. Nasty stuff. The slight leaks at pump glands would crystalise to a white greenish deposit due to the copper parts in the system.

Did anybody use that Shell oil like cutting fluid used in cooling systems that when mixed with lube oil turned to a grey sludge when coming out the LOP. I was on an MAN 1956 vintage that used it.
Flying Bedsteads had the best idea, oil cooled top and bottom pistons on telescopics, any leak into the crankcase didn't matter.
The slight downside was in high sea temps you needed both oil pumps on to increase circulation, but no big deal.


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## Brian Dobbie

sternchallis said:


> Would that be AB Dobbie, known for scooping up 45 gallon of HFO and pouring it down a fuel vent, that suddenly appeared overnight as deck cargo on a former Strick Line ship known for these antics because of a design fault, circa 1982.


Former Strick Line ship??? 
Fuel oil on deck??? unheard off.


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## dannic

Engine Serang said:


> I have a recollection that on the Regent Falcon it was 6000 psi.
> 
> Perhaps I should also check out an old Peoples Home.


Sorry and yes you are correct, remember getting a kick in the backside when changing over fuel return cock to day tanks - dont you realise what the pressure in that pipe is??
Dannic.


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## OilJiver

Brian Dobbie said:


> ...Fuel oil on deck??? unheard off.


Quite right!

But plenty HFO available (now and then) around the middles (and below) when one of those 6000psi pipes split..


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## pitcrew

*High pressure plant*

After I left the merchant navy I got a job as a mechanical fitter, with Union Carbide, in a low density polyethylene plant.
At the interview the chief maintenance engineer asked if I had any experience working with high pressure. 
At the same time as I said yes he said you won’t have.
What pressures have you worked with? He said. I’ve worked on Doxford fuel gear of 6,000 psi says I. And we tested at 12,000 psi.
Well we work at reactor pressures of 38,000 psi, we test at 75,000 psi and we auto fret at 120,000 psi.
I thought he was letting numbers run away with him but he wasn’t, it was frightening the pressures we worked at but the wages were great and I spent 15 years there. After a period of time they dropped the reactor pressure to 32,000 psi because the plant was wearing on a bit.
The ethylene came into the plant at 5 psi, through reciprocating compressors up to 195 psi, 195 to 550 psi then through a rotary compressor before going into what they called an intensifier which was a huge ram pump, four of them to each reactor.
The big money polyethylene went all over the world for the sheathing on sub sea telephone cable and fetched a tremendous price back in the day. Satellites put an end to that earner so Union Carbide pulled out and BP took over with high density polyethylene but at a much lower pressure.
Auto fretting involved hydraulically pressurising the reactor tubes, which came from the USA, so that they stretched before they were installed in the reactors.
Occasionally things went wrong.When ethylene at 38,000 psi catches fire it’s a sight to behold! Squeaky bum time.

Regards,
Pitcrew.


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## Duncan112

sternchallis said:


> Did anybody use that Shell oil like cutting fluid used in cooling systems that when mixed with lube oil turned to a grey sludge when coming out the LOP.


Unfortunately, yes on P&OCL's MAN KZs, if you put too much in the header tank at once, it boiled over, but a handful of Epsom Salts sorted it. One voyage the "Horses Head" that carried the coolant to the X Head fell off, the sump resembled Bailey's Irish Cream.

Used a refractometer to check the concentration, and the "Speedy Tester" to find out how bad the sump water contamination was, any less than 5% was a cause for rejoicing.


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## OilJiver

pitcrew said:


> …..At the interview the chief maintenance engineer asked if I had any experience working with high pressure...



Well you got the job Pitcrew so your Doxford knowledge must have impressed! (Or maybe he recognised that you could work _under_ much pressure).

Hairy stuff you describe for sure. Thanks for interesting post.


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## Brian Dobbie

OilJiver said:


> Quite right!
> 
> But plenty HFO available (now and then) around the middles (and below) when one of those 6000psi pipes split..


I remember having problems sealing the fuel pipes at the top of the ac***ulators but otherwise never had too much trouble.
The Rt-Flex fuel pipes were always leaking at the injectors.


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## OilJiver

Might have been unlucky Brian, but definitely a few times during 1 trip when pipes to timing blocks split.
(Spare pipe in continuous lengths so cut and shaped to fit). No recurrence after replacement so maybe down to material defects or length of time in service. Certainly made a mess.
Rgds OJ


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## Brian Dobbie

OilJiver said:


> Might have been unlucky Brian, but definitely a few times during 1 trip when pipes to timing blocks split.
> (Spare pipe in continuous lengths so cut and shaped to fit). No recurrence after replacement so maybe down to material defects or length of time in service. Certainly made a mess.
> Rgds OJ


Ah timing blocks, one of the new Doxfords.
The first I sailed on was 1947 vintage then a 1957 vintage. The 1957 had timing blocks a huge improvement.
The 1947 was the old style mechanical fuel injectors.
We have come a long way, now with solenoid controlled injectors.


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## Chillytoes

I only sailed briefly on one Doxford and it was no trouble at all. A good unit. However, as a dockyard apprentice, worked on two ships with Doxfords which required regular, and I mean regular, re-metalling and scraping in of main and bottom ends.


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## Tim Gibbs

Doxford engines could in no way be described as being sophisticated but the crankshafts were complex, difficult to build but easy to bend and break and they were mechanically very complicated with a huge number of moving parts in each cylinder. As a consequence, they were noisy – not particularly loud but lots of different sounds. Each cylinder sounded different and you quickly became attuned to what was normal and were alert to changes that might indicate problems developing. Counterintuitively, when a noise disappeared it was not necessarily good news as it could be the prelude to something very nasty happening. There is a good YouTube video clip 




taken on the top platform on a twin engine ship that illustrates the noises quite well. It is also the case that the Doxford engine controls seemed unnecessarily complicated. Other engines were controlled by a single large hand wheel or just two levers but Doxfords had three levers and a handwheel and if you were unlucky enough to have your Doxford made by North Eastern Marine Engineering you probably had the joy of five levers to juggle – great for octopuses. The Doxford engines we had with cylinder diameters of 670mm and less ran reasonably well but the 750mm diameter engines were fairly bad news. A case of too many millimetres spoiling the broth?


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## Scottsnostalgia

*Memories of Doxfords*

Tim, Many memories of these old ‘ladies’. First trip at sea was with Ellerman Stricht Line on MV Baluchistan (all steam aux apart from 6LB Doxford main engine). I was a young ‘green’ Junior Eng on my first trip out to the Persian Gulf. Not so fond memories of outward bound. We had to heave to every other day due to water ingress into crankcase/ lib oil from piston cooling water pipe and gland leakages. We were OK on way home (turns out we were running at too low a circulating water pressure, causing cavitation...lol)
Also sailed on Sugar Line’s Sugar Importer, which had a more modern Doxford, with oil cooled lower pistons. No real problems with this model, apart from regularly breaking fuel pumps struts and changing out upper piston CW hoses.


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## dannic

OilJiver said:


> Might have been unlucky Brian, but definitely a few times during 1 trip when pipes to timing blocks split.
> (Spare pipe in continuous lengths so cut and shaped to fit). No recurrence after replacement so maybe down to material defects or length of time in service. Certainly made a mess.
> Rgds OJ


onboard made fuel pipes would likely have an uneven inner surface, and at 6000 psi this would generate pressure surges in excess of speed of sound! Had this problem on Sulzer HP fuel pipes that had been repaired.

Dannic


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## Tim Gibbs

Yes lower piston cw system cavitation was a problem . Tried running both P&J pumps on 75LB6 engines to maximise pressure but pipes still got eaten !


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## Tim Gibbs

On reflection what would probably have helped would have been to shut in the outlets to increase the back pressure. But of course not much could be done without major mods.because of the way the P&Js discharged into the tundish.


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## sternchallis

Brian Dobbie said:


> Former Strick Line ship???
> Fuel oil on deck??? unheard off.


Having recently talked with Kieth the 3/E on that voyage, I believe the Chinese 4th was instructed to press up the after HFO tanks whilst crossing the Tasman Sea, this caused the HFO deck cargo to appear the following morning. 
Due to low ambient temps the oil was semi solid and required the use of a tempermental steam cleaner to warm it up so it could be scraped up to be poured down the sounding pipe.
I can picture you now in the very off white fridge duffel coat.
Mandama, ex Taupo.
Dave Richards who sailed on her in both liveries said it was a common occurance.
Met up with Harry Curry recently at an ad hoc BSL Geordi reunion.


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## davall33

Tim Gibbs said:


> I had thought that the majority of my sea time was spent with LB Doxfords but looking back into my discharge book I realise that was not the case – it just seemed that way ‘cos lots of “stuff” happen during those times!
> The Doxford engine, with its uniflow scavenging and constant pressure fuel injection, certainly had the best fuel consumption of its time and, with no combustion loads transmitted to the structure, were relatively vibration free but …… it was so mechanically complicated!
> Main bearings was in a spherical pocket, and each unit had two pistons and so many bearings; three bottom end bearings in spherical housings, three crosshead bearings and slippers, two side rod bearings and a big centre bearing in the transverse beam.
> Despite this, the engines up to 670mm bore seemed to run quite well but, of course, the number of components resulted in a large maintenance load compared with single piston engines even when they were running well.
> For my sins most of my time was spent with 75LB6 engines and because I didn’t know much different I didn’t realise at the time how bad they were. I think there were only 12 of this size built and our company had six of them and I sailed on 4 of those.
> Before they were 4 years old, all our engines had to have new crankshafts due to a design defect. However, they still had a weakness in that No 3 forward and No 4 aft crankwebs were highly stressed at the internal fillet with the adjacent main journal. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the ships themselves were very flexible and resulted in having to be careful with crankshaft alignment and I became quite proficient at threading a piano wire through the engine and the aft engine room bulkhead to the aft peak bulkhead. However that didn’t stop us finding a large fracture in No.4 on one ship and having carried out a sort of repair sailed back to the UK to discover another fracture at No3 as the engine was being dismantled to receive it’s third crankshaft in 12 years.
> All these engines kept the likes of Andrews Master Hones and Golten Marine in business machining our journals and pins in situ as we had numerous bearing failures. For reasons I can’t remember we has several failures of bottom end bearings resulting from the white metal breaking up like crazy paving. Other failures probably resulted from locked sphericals and dirt and water contaminated lube oil.
> Being non-diaphragm engines it was a battle to keep the oil clean, not helped by high piston ring and liner wear rates, so we fitted larger bottom piston scraper drains and run purifiers continuously and injected trisodiumphosphate to decrease the acidity .
> Water contamination was a problem because the bottom piston cooling water system, in addition to the usual gland problems, also suffered for severe erosion and despite setting off with lots of elbows and pipes, there never seem to be enough.
> As a consequence of dirty, wet oil we ended up with a very severe microbial attack on one ship and a lesser attack on another that resulted in more profits for the in situ machiners and the airlines flying crosshead pins back to the UK for microfinishing.
> This size engine also seemed to suffer for disproportionally high were rates with the transverse pin bearings compare with the smaller bore engines. I wonder if this had anything to do with the exceptional flexibility of the crankshaft? We had a good example of this with the engine with the fractured crasnkshaft; a large steel strap has been fitted around the crankweb and we had to cut a bit of the bedplate away to allow it to rotate. However when we started the engine we found the strap was fouling the bedplate despite there being ample clearance in the static condition!
> There were many more issues but I don’t remember feeling bad about them – in my ignorance I just thought that was the way of things when you went to sea as an engineer in the '60s. But then I did my “steam time”………….. and my eyes were opened!


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## davall33

dannic said:


> Trisodiumphosphate? we used that as cooling water treatment!!
> Dannic.


Hi
I was a junior when you joined thw Colombo and decided not to do the voyage One of my better decisions


Tim Gibbs said:


> I had thought that the majority of my sea time was spent with LB Doxfords but looking back into my discharge book I realise that was not the case – it just seemed that way ‘cos lots of “stuff” happen during those times!
> The Doxford engine, with its uniflow scavenging and constant pressure fuel injection, certainly had the best fuel consumption of its time and, with no combustion loads transmitted to the structure, were relatively vibration free but …… it was so mechanically complicated!
> Main bearings was in a spherical pocket, and each unit had two pistons and so many bearings; three bottom end bearings in spherical housings, three crosshead bearings and slippers, two side rod bearings and a big centre bearing in the transverse beam.
> Despite this, the engines up to 670mm bore seemed to run quite well but, of course, the number of components resulted in a large maintenance load compared with single piston engines even when they were running well.
> For my sins most of my time was spent with 75LB6 engines and because I didn’t know much different I didn’t realise at the time how bad they were. I think there were only 12 of this size built and our company had six of them and I sailed on 4 of those.
> Before they were 4 years old, all our engines had to have new crankshafts due to a design defect. However, they still had a weakness in that No 3 forward and No 4 aft crankwebs were highly stressed at the internal fillet with the adjacent main journal. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the ships themselves were very flexible and resulted in having to be careful with crankshaft alignment and I became quite proficient at threading a piano wire through the engine and the aft engine room bulkhead to the aft peak bulkhead. However that didn’t stop us finding a large fracture in No.4 on one ship and having carried out a sort of repair sailed back to the UK to discover another fracture at No3 as the engine was being dismantled to receive it’s third crankshaft in 12 years.
> All these engines kept the likes of Andrews Master Hones and Golten Marine in business machining our journals and pins in situ as we had numerous bearing failures. For reasons I can’t remember we has several failures of bottom end bearings resulting from the white metal breaking up like crazy paving. Other failures probably resulted from locked sphericals and dirt and water contaminated lube oil.
> Being non-diaphragm engines it was a battle to keep the oil clean, not helped by high piston ring and liner wear rates, so we fitted larger bottom piston scraper drains and run purifiers continuously and injected trisodiumphosphate to decrease the acidity .
> Water contamination was a problem because the bottom piston cooling water system, in addition to the usual gland problems, also suffered for severe erosion and despite setting off with lots of elbows and pipes, there never seem to be enough.
> As a consequence of dirty, wet oil we ended up with a very severe microbial attack on one ship and a lesser attack on another that resulted in more profits for the in situ machiners and the airlines flying crosshead pins back to the UK for microfinishing.
> This size engine also seemed to suffer for disproportionally high were rates with the transverse pin bearings compare with the smaller bore engines. I wonder if this had anything to do with the exceptional flexibility of the crankshaft? We had a good example of this with the engine with the fractured crasnkshaft; a large steel strap has been fitted around the crankweb and we had to cut a bit of the bedplate away to allow it to rotate. However when we started the engine we found the strap was fouling the bedplate despite there being ample clearance in the static condition!
> There were many more issues but I don’t remember feeling bad about them – in my ignorance I just thought that was the way of things when you went to sea as an engineer in the '60s. But then I did my “steam time”………….. and my eyes were opened!


Hi
I was a junior when you joined the City of Colombo and I decided not to do the voyage
One of my better decisions 
Many tears later I met Pete Omerod & Donny McInnis
I sailed with "Willie" Mitchell on the big four
Looking through later crew lists I see many former cadets sailing as 2nds & Chiefs
Many myths & legends were born about that voyage


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## Tim Gibbs

davall33 said:


> Hi
> I was a junior when you joined thw Colombo and decided not to do the voyage One of my better decisions
> 
> Hi
> I was a junior when you joined the City of Colombo and I decided not to do the voyage
> One of my better decisions
> Many tears later I met Pete Omerod & Donny McInnis
> I sailed with "Willie" Mitchell on the big four
> Looking through later crew lists I see many former cadets sailing as 2nds & Chiefs
> Many myths & legends were born about that voyage


When I came ashore as a superintendent I still couldn't escape the 'Colombo as isheone of my ships. For me, the final straw was in 1973(?) when she had a severe microbial attack in Canada on the crankshaft journals and pins. That was after she got stuck in the ice damaging the bow and prop. requiring to return to the UK and a few expensive weeks in Smiths Dock, North Shields. "Stuff" certainly happened to her on a far too regular basis!


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## Peter Hewson

Baluchistan, I coasted her in `72 as 3/E. I needed a few days to make my Sea Time up for Part B seconds. There where a whole "Class" of (Strick) Ships with that, 4 or 6 Cyl Doxfords, (LB`s?) and steam Auxiliaries. A couple had one of the steam Generators taken out (of a hole cut in the hull) and a single 4 Cyl Diesel Genny "inserted". It was suposed to do all the "port work" and save Boiler fuel. But 90% of the time we still ran both the boilers to keep the Steam Derick winches going on out ports when discharging to barges!. Changing out and or repacking Lower piston swinging glands was a regular "field day". Getting it done during the morning watch was good for the 4th, as he had to keep the watch!. (in theory) so the 3rd and Junior where spot ball!!. Heave to, stop the LO pumps, shut off the ofending piston. and "don the gunny sacks" looking like a bunch of Friars!, to try and keep the worst of the dripping oil/water off, with practice we got it down to a matter of minutes!.


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## Tim Gibbs

Peter Hewson said:


> Baluchistan, I coasted her in `72 as 3/E. ..............................Changing out and or repacking Lower piston swinging glands was a regular "field day". Getting it done during the morning watch was good for the 4th, as he had to keep the watch!. (in theory) so the 3rd and Junior where spot ball!!. Heave to, stop the LO pumps, shut off the ofending piston. and "don the gunny sacks" looking like a bunch of Friars!, to try and keep the worst of the dripping oil/water off, with practice we got it down to a matter of minutes!.


And people worried about the sun giving us skin cancer! I've just had a small bit of low grade cancer removed from an area that has seen more oil and sludge than sunlight !


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## davall33

Tim Gibbs said:


> And people worried about the sun giving us skin cancer! I've just had a small bit of low grade cancer removed from an area that has seen more oil and sludge than sunlight !


I wonder how well we were protected back then
No skincare precautions but "Jonnies" like wellington boots!!!
How many out there are now suffering hearing loss (due to years spent with twin Doxfords blaring in your ears)
ear defenders were either not supplied or not used
I now have a fast pass to my local Skin clinic


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## Peter Hewson

Yep!. As soon as we got south of Biscay. We got turned out on deck, servicing and checking the winches and windlass`, and later deck cranes, for the abuse the Arab wharfie`s where going to give them in the Gulf. Pair of shorts and (sometimes) an old cap with a rag to keep the sun off the neck. No wonder with hindsight, I keep having to have "things" removed from my skin!. The joke in our house, is my hearing range is only deficiant on the frequencies of womens voices!.

Pete


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## Tim Gibbs

davall33 said:


> I wonder how well we were protected back then
> No skincare precautions but "Jonnies" like wellington boots!!!
> How many out there are now suffering hearing loss (due to years spent with twin Doxfords blaring in your ears)
> ear defenders were either not supplied or not used
> I now have a fast pass to my local Skin clinic


In the scheme of things I think the naruraly aspirated Doxfords were quite quiet - until a relief valve lifted  
I think it was the turbchargers and the turbo-alternator sets and 65 bar steam leaks that did for me.


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## HEM

Tim Gibbs said:


> I had thought that the majority of my sea time was spent with LB Doxfords but looking back into my discharge book I realise that was not the case – it just seemed that way ‘cos lots of “stuff” happen during those times!
> The Doxford engine, with its uniflow scavenging and constant pressure fuel injection, certainly had the best fuel consumption of its time and, with no combustion loads transmitted to the structure, were relatively vibration free but …… it was so mechanically complicated!
> Main bearings was in a spherical pocket, and each unit had two pistons and so many bearings; three bottom end bearings in spherical housings, three crosshead bearings and slippers, two side rod bearings and a big centre bearing in the transverse beam.
> Despite this, the engines up to 670mm bore seemed to run quite well but, of course, the number of components resulted in a large maintenance load compared with single piston engines even when they were running well.
> For my sins most of my time was spent with 75LB6 engines and because I didn’t know much different I didn’t realise at the time how bad they were. I think there were only 12 of this size built and our company had six of them and I sailed on 4 of those.
> Before they were 4 years old, all our engines had to have new crankshafts due to a design defect. However, they still had a weakness in that No 3 forward and No 4 aft crankwebs were highly stressed at the internal fillet with the adjacent main journal. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the ships themselves were very flexible and resulted in having to be careful with crankshaft alignment and I became quite proficient at threading a piano wire through the engine and the aft engine room bulkhead to the aft peak bulkhead. However that didn’t stop us finding a large fracture in No.4 on one ship and having carried out a sort of repair sailed back to the UK to discover another fracture at No3 as the engine was being dismantled to receive it’s third crankshaft in 12 years.
> All these engines kept the likes of Andrews Master Hones and Golten Marine in business machining our journals and pins in situ as we had numerous bearing failures. For reasons I can’t remember we has several failures of bottom end bearings resulting from the white metal breaking up like crazy paving. Other failures probably resulted from locked sphericals and dirt and water contaminated lube oil.
> Being non-diaphragm engines it was a battle to keep the oil clean, not helped by high piston ring and liner wear rates, so we fitted larger bottom piston scraper drains and run purifiers continuously and injected trisodiumphosphate to decrease the acidity .
> Water contamination was a problem because the bottom piston cooling water system, in addition to the usual gland problems, also suffered for severe erosion and despite setting off with lots of elbows and pipes, there never seem to be enough.
> As a consequence of dirty, wet oil we ended up with a very severe microbial attack on one ship and a lesser attack on another that resulted in more profits for the in situ machiners and the airlines flying crosshead pins back to the UK for microfinishing.
> This size engine also seemed to suffer for disproportionally high were rates with the transverse pin bearings compare with the smaller bore engines. I wonder if this had anything to do with the exceptional flexibility of the crankshaft? We had a good example of this with the engine with the fractured crasnkshaft; a large steel strap has been fitted around the crankweb and we had to cut a bit of the bedplate away to allow it to rotate. However when we started the engine we found the strap was fouling the bedplate despite there being ample clearance in the static condition!
> There were many more issues but I don’t remember feeling bad about them – in my ignorance I just thought that was the way of things when you went to sea as an engineer in the '60s. But then I did my “steam time”………….. and my eyes were opened!


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## keating1975

I have uploaded a video taken (cine film) in 1958 of the mv Tyrone to my YouTube channel (Capspread) - it is Part One of a two part video. I'm hoping that Part Two will be uploaded next weekend. But I am looking for a sound effect of a Doxford Engine. Any idea where I could find it?


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## Tim Gibbs

keating1975 said:


> I have uploaded a video taken (cine film) in 1958 of the mv Tyrone to my YouTube channel (Capspread) - it is Part One of a two part video. I'm hoping that Part Two will be uploaded next weekend. But I am looking for a sound effect of a Doxford Engine. Any idea where I could find it?





keating1975 said:


> I have uploaded a video taken (cine film) in 1958 of the mv Tyrone to my YouTube channel (Capspread) - it is Part One of a two part video. I'm hoping that Part Two will be uploaded next weekend. But I am looking for a sound effect of a Doxford Engine. Any idea where I could find it?


Lots on YouTube


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## HEM

csturnbull said:


> Interesting stuff, takes me back to my Elder Dempster days over fifty years ago, nearly all Doxfords with the odd one or two B&W's. I have just been looking at the old Port Sydney on YouTube but I cannot remember what the small wheel was for on the left of the controls!! Time to book into the Old Peoples Home I think!!
> Can anyone refresh an old brain??
> Cheers
> Cliff


that small wheel adjusts the fuel pressure in the common rail system.
Hugh Martin


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## csturnbull

HEM said:


> that small wheel adjusts the fuel pressure in the common rail system.
> Hugh Martin


I think I remember now didn't it have to be kept at 6000psi approx?.
Cheers for that.
Clive


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## Tim Gibbs

HEM said:


> that small wheel adjusts the fuel pressure in the common rail system.
> Hugh Martin


If you had a NEM Doxford it might have had the pressure control handwheel replaced by a lever and if you were lucky enough to have a pre-timing valve engine with NEMSTOP you could have had yet another lever making five - idea for octopuses ?


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## HEM

Tim Gibbs said:


> If you had a NEM Doxford it might have had the pressure control handwheel replaced by a lever and if you were lucky enough to have a pre-timing valve engine with NEMSTOP you could have had yet another lever making five - idea for octopuses ?


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## Bankman

csturnbull said:


> Maybe it was 6000psi. I know the start air was 600psi. Racking the old grey matter once again!!


Bang on 6000 no maybes


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## Bankman

Bankman said:


> Bang on 6000 no maybes


That one dead easy to remember,need more 🧠 food in diet.


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