[QUOTE=injunear;66606]I’m trying to remember the name of the outfit off Navigation in Houston that rebuilt and upgraded engines. I believe they were bought out by Preco. They always had 268A’s, 278’s, OP’s and 567’s of various series grazing in the pasture behind the shop. They were very good about getting spares or repairs to any of the “hybrids”. (as some called them in the '60s and '70s)[/QUOTE]
I have been racking my brain doing just the same thing. And I was up at that shop fairly often. They had quite the operation up there. Stewart and Stevenson used to do some, but not nearly as much as the one that we are thinking of. I remember when Preco bought them, since I had done a bunch of work with Preco back when Crowley bought the Robin tugs. Preco was the contractor that refurbished those wonderful Alcos. . . . Man. What was the name of that outfit. . . . . .
Our conversions were done by MSi. You’re right about the odd-ball injectors in the conversion engines but Interstate (the OEM for EMD) has stepped up with injectors for these conversion engines. Our engines are only used for ship docking so we don’t run at full power very often so we don’t really have any block problems. We also don’t increase the rating. A 16-567D3A is rated at 2500 horsepower while a 16-645E7 would be 3300 horsepower. If you don’t change the props you don’t change the horsepower. As EMD doesn’t support the 567 engines anymore, having one of the conversions actually makes it easier to get parts. Our conversion engines use almost entirely off the shelf 645 parts.
MSI. That is the ond that I was thinking of. Hatch and Kirk did some, too. MSI did the ones that I was thinking of. 87cr, do you live in the Houston area?
Actually, now that I am awake, I realize that it wasn’t MSI, even though I posted twice above. Oops. MSI used to do a lot of work for a company that I worked for out of Lake Charles and they were VERY good at what they did. They are based out of Louisiana (MSI). The company that I am thinking of was based out of Houston, like Hatch and Kirk is/was.
I worked on a Maritrans boat that had 567’s upgraded with 645 packs. Also I worked on quiter a few boats up in NY way back when that had the same setup. As for the Maritrans Tugs, we ran with reduced RPM’s and I have to say that these boats were some of the best running EMD’s that I have worked on, and I have sailed on many EMD powered Tugs. There was a short period of time where they wanted us to run to our rated RPM which was 800 on a 567c. I cranked them up after getting it in writing from my Port Engineer. Well after running for years at a max of 760 you should have seen all of the smoke coming off of the lagging. LOL The Captain said he had never been on a tug that went that fast with a light barge (small maybe 35,000 bbls) on the hip. The increase in RPM’s did not last very long as our fuel consumption went through the roof.
IMHO, if you run a converted engine a little under rated RPM and use decent parts you should get good performance and longevity out of these engines.
If you don’t change the props you will not load the conversion engine any differently than the original. My company spent the money to do a turbo conversion on a pair of 12-645’s but they never changed the props so the boat remained at 3000 horsepower until recently. We did eventually change the props and picked up our bollard pull form 38 tons to 50 tons.
[QUOTE=power230;66869]Hatch and Kirk is off Navigation. Been there for almost 50 years…[/QUOTE]
Looking at the road map, I still want to say that was Red Manning back in the '70s. All of my old Chiefs and port engineers have all departed so it’s hard for me to verify.
[QUOTE=injunear;66942]Looking at the road map, I still want to say that was Red Manning back in the '70s. All of my old Chiefs and port engineers have all departed so it’s hard for me to verify.[/QUOTE]
I am thinking of 80s/90s. I tried looking at a map but it didn’t help. I am a victim of my mispent youth. Oh, and to kind of put the thread back on track, I have an EMD 645E7 manual, but I keep close tabs on it. Lord knows when I am going to have to change out a power pack again. The only real useful thing that I had (and have lost) was the torque value pocket card. That kept the manual from getting too greasy. . . . .
I am thinking of 80s/90s. I tried looking at a map but it didn’t help. I am a victim of my mispent youth. Oh, and to kind of put the thread back on track, I have an EMD 645E7 manual, but I keep close tabs on it. Lord knows when I am going to have to change out a power pack again. The only real useful thing that I had (and have lost) was the torque value pocket card. That kept the manual from getting too greasy. . . . .[/QUOTE