Topic moved from "Sedan Duck #1 Umiak IS HERE"

Robert Straghan said

quote:

I considered the bigger Racors as well but was not convinced that my Deere would flow enough to generate sufficient turbulence. As we all know bigger is better. Is engine fuel flow a factor?

The Walbro fuel pump is really a fuel transfer pump and one needs far higher flow for a skookum polishing system. This is a mission critical part and while rated at 18000 hours I carry a spare. Note that there is a small internal filter that needs to be cleaned.

I agree that the fuel flow on our engines is not sufficient to keep the fuel in the tank clean. The larger Racors are in case bad fuel is taken on that the filters won't plug up so fast that I can't replace one while operating off of the other. The filtering area in the 500's just seem a little small for our tastes.

Since none of our boats have a robust fuel polishing system (I can't remember whether Don was able to finagle SHM into doing something different for Ice), I am curious as to what approaches Duck owners use (will use in our case) to prevent fuel related engine problems.

WOW ..interesting reading...my main concern for Fuel is the potential to damage the transfere pump with paper fibres from the towels...that is proven...so I like the sock on the GCF...but the price is a strong argument for sure...same too with the oil bypass filter, but I only intend to use that if my oil carrying ability or oil filter supply becomes an issue..say if I was steaming for ever or something...especially until I have done maybe 1000 hours on the engine using all standard set up incase there is ever a problem with warrantee etc...so it sits ready to go...

I got Ben Ben to get some Biocide in for me from Port Supply on a Dangerous goods shipment when he got his..just pay extra..

Sitting on ICE at the moment with Faulty pannel alarms...so can go nowhere!!!..just screaming..the pannel that is???

quote:

Originally posted by Jerie Milici:
Our youngest daughter, Lauren, is graduating this May from the Coast Guard Academy and has been billited on the Cutter Midgett stationed out of Seattle. She is looking forward to meeting the ship a 387 cutter that goes all over the Pacific. Jerie and I are retiring in June of 09 and will then begin the voyage south from New England. If we decide to go through the Panama Canal with our Diesel Duck 462 (#3) we may be coming up to Seattle to visit.

Good luck with your DD. Hope to see you on the cruising circuit.

That is exciting for both you and your daughter! The USCG has a big presence in Seattle with 2 or 3 cutters and 2 or 3 ice breakers home ported here.

Our plans are to spend at least several years prowling the route from Puget Sound to Alaska and back. If you plans include the upper left hand corner of the USA, please let us know we'd love to visit or buddy boat with you. An e-mail address to contact us directly is "KurtWH52" at gmail dot com.

Dear Marcia and Kurt
Our youngest daughter,Lauren, is graduating this May from the Coast Guard Academy and has been billited on the Cutter Midgett stationed out of Seattle. She is looking forward to meeting the ship a 387 cutter that goes all over the Pacific. Jerie and I are retiring in June of 09 and will then begin the voyage south from New England. If we decide to go through the Panama Canal with our Diesel Duck 462 (#3) we may be coming up to Seattle to visit.

Good luck with your DD. Hope to see you on the cruising circuit.

After the break in period on the John Deere I used Shell Rotella T on the recommendation of a diesel mechanic who had worked in the NYC public transit for years. Later I mentioned it to a Deere representative in New Jersey and he told me they use Rotella T when they do an oil change for their customers. Steve at the Deere mechanics school ( see a recent issue of Passagemaker for the school details)also indicated that Rotella T was fine. Our local Deere mechanic also uses it.

The short if the oil meets the technical specs provided by Deere then any brand meeting these specs is fine. Mobil,as long as it meets or exceeds the engine specs will be fine as well.

Bounty have been downsized and the "old" version is now called Bounty Mega. it seems to fit into the housing OK

Interesting about the GCF on your gennie. Mine is mounted so that the oil flows back into the sump and overfills the engine but this seems easy enough to fix. Oil pressure drop is the main concern and while I am at home now I think it went from in the 50's to in the low 30's which did not seem high enough for me. Partially opening the feed valve can control oil pressure to a comfortable level, but naturally flow through the filter is reduced.

250 hours on the Deere now and I am going to change from dino oil to Mobil 1 Delvac.

I guess the gennie GCF will be next on my long list of things to address.

Robert

I have six of the GCF filter elements on board but just as backup and I use paper towels as filters. I bought all the bounty towels I could carry from the Royal Subic and I think they were expensive at around $3.00 US per. Last night I bought six rolls of a generic paper towel here in Singapore at .77 US each. I had to rewrap even the Bounty to get them tighter and bigger to fill up the filter housing.
I installed an oil bypass filter on both my John Deere and Northern Lights Genset and I don't remember it dropping the oil pressure over five pounds which GCF predicted.
I change the oil bypass elements (paper towels)every 150 hours and thus six quarts of oil each time. At the same time I installed the bypass filters I installed an oil change system which I documented on this forum.
I'm happy with this system and I think it will prolong both engine's work life.
Randal

Why not use Bounty towels?

The GCF was originally designed for Bounty paper towels(now Bounty Mega size) and while the new proprietary filters MAY be better, from a cost/performance basis it is difficult to beat the Bounty. Royal Duty Free in Subic has these Mega towels in stock, and I foolishly brought 3 cases from Canada in my outfitting sea shipment

I had to modify my GCF to reuse the black filter end holder in order to use the Bounty.
I also have a GCF by-pass on the Deere. I have not figured out the one on the gennie as it causes a big drop in oil pressure so sits unused but looking pretty.

Is this new filter marketing on behalf of GCF or is it really a better filter? How many microns is overkill?

BTW where to buy fuel biocide in Subic. Port Supply will not ship as it is deemed hazardous and none to be found locally

Hi...just bought my first replacement Gulf Coast polishing filters...buy price was OK but frieght impossible..cost AUD$500 for 6 landed in Subic???..ouch!

Hi,
We have electric and manual fuel transfer pumps that can be used to send fuel to a day tank. The transfer pump selected sends the fuel through a Racor 1000 filter and then to a selector-Y that allows you to send the fuel back to any other tank (for trimming as well as polishing) or to the day tank. From the day tank, fuel exits via dual Racor 500s with a selector switch and a pressure gauge. The only down side of the system is that there are an awful lot of valves to set up and label (and check).

quote:

Originally posted by Hugh Palmer:
Slightly off topic here. I'm curious on your choice of the Lugger. Why did you go for this over the deere or the IVECO? What benefits did you see for the cost differential?

I'm posting this out of general curiousity only. Not looking to start a "my engine is better than your engine thread"

At the time we wrote up the contract with SHM, the JD engine wasn't an option (I think this was following the bad experience of JD USA not liking the exhaust system that JD Asia had approved on DD462-01).

Since our primary cruising ground will be the PNW, we wanted an engine that would have easy serviceability. Iveco is pretty uncommon in boats around here. That left the Lugger engine.

The biggest complaint we hear about Lugger is their cost. We felt the Lugger would improve the resale of the boat either in price or in a shorter time on the market and offset some of its higher upfront cost.

The issues of normally aspirated vs turbo-charged or electronic injection vs mechanical are not concerns we have. We just have not heard of them causing problems for the newer engines, be they JD/Lugger, Cummins, Caterpillar, etc.

We also joke that we're trying to source as many systems as possible from Ballard (a neighborhood in Seattle where the fishing industry and its suppliers, Lugger included, live). We got to take pictures of our engine before it was shipped off to Asia.

Marcia and Kurt,

Slightly off topic here. I'm curious on your choice of the Lugger. Why did you go for this over the deere or the IVECO? What benefits did you see for the cost differential?

I'm posting this out of general curiousity only. Not looking to start a "my engine is better than your engine thread"

Thanks.


Hugh

quote:

Originally posted by Marcia & Kurt:
We are having the Lugger 1066T installed on our boat (a Lugger marinized Deere 6068) and are attending an owner's class at the Lugger factory this Thursday (2/22). We'll try to remember to ask them their recommendation at that time.

We asked Bob Senter of Lugger/Northern Lights his recommendation on Racor sizing. He said a Racor 500 for a L1066T (JD6068) would be adequate but thought a 900 would be a better match. For what its worth, Nordhavn uses the Racor 900 on its boats with the L1066T installed. But, it sounds like either will work.

quote:

Originally posted by Robert Straghan:
I have always been under the impression that Racors need sufficent flow to operate properly. Larger filters need more flow, and my little Deere will not flow enough to take advantage of the larger filter area of the 900 series.

We had not heard that before. We are having the Lugger 1066T installed on our boat (a Lugger marinized Deere 6068) and are attending an owner's class at the Lugger factory this Thursday (2/22). We'll try to remember to ask them their recommendation at that time.

Marica - you seem to have misunderstood my question. Yes bigger offers a larger filter area, however it may not be better.

I have always been under the impression that Racors need sufficent flow to operate properly. Larger filters need more flow, and my little Deere will not flow enough to take advantage of the larger filter area of the 900 series.

Terry is a Racor expert and perhaps he can set this straight

Don -

That sounds like another thing to add to our "watch out for" list.

In your case, was the bad fuel contamination in all of your tanks with bad fuel or was the contamination more than what the Gulf Coast could filter out?

We'll do our best to keep one of our four tanks "pure" with only filtered fuel in it. Since, I believe, each our out tanks has a separate fill inlet, it may be easy for us to mark one of them with a big red "X" or similar symbol as a reminder.

BTW - How is the Bounty boat journey coming? Your web site says you are still looking for two more crew (victims?).

Hi Guys!

Yes ICE is standard SHM and I am happy enough with the set up..twin Racors and the walbro pump for polishing through the big Gulf Coast filter...Plan "WAS" to always filter ALL fuel through the Gulf Coast Filter into the day tank or utility Tank so you always know it is cleaned....the problem was the original 1000ltrs but in by drums at the yard to start sea trials was BAD...so I had all sorts of issues on the way to SUBIC....anyway once that is sorted I will always use a Biocide in the triopics and polish fuel back into and through the various tanks if they are standing for awhile...slowly with the Walbro pump and always only ever fill the day tank through the Gulf Coast...the Duel 500 Racors are great and more than big enough for a Duck...I also carry a spare Walbro....