Mobilised offshore to assess a failed CAT D349 engine, our engineers discovered the engine to have spun the main bearings on one journal. This resulted in a damaged cranksaft and cylinder block which due to the installation was not possible to carry out an insitu repair.
Our onshore team set out to find a replacement engine, which being a 1972 engine was extremely difficult as they are now very rare. Amazingly however, our team managed to find a used, almost identical engine that was only 4 serial numbers apart. This was previously used on a dredger in Belgium.
As this installation offshore is a critical piece of equipment, the client wanted peace of mind, so a full strip and rebuild was conducted in our Great Yarmouth workshop. This came with many problems due to the age and obsolescence issues, but all were overcome by the team, with parts sourced from various CAT dealers’ surplus stock from around the world and many items overhauled in-house.
Following rebuild, the engine underwent extensive testing in our custom-built test facility and performed very well. Pulling its expected power and speed requirements, as requested by the client.
The engine has now returned offshore – installed and commissioned by one of our offshore engineers for use in the field for many years to come.
Dan Platten, service manager says:
we have been able to save our client considerable cost by finding and refurbishing an existing engine. It’s also great to see the reuse of a nearly 50 year old engine.
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