Definately soogie. Used by Royal and Commonwealth Navies for centuries. Wash down or soogie the upper deck or galley etc.,
Soogy always meant a deep clean when I worked on tugs.
Remember those days well- hated “soogeeing”
Probably from “Dhobi”, a Hindi word that means “washing” and commonly used by British seafarers; “Doing your Dhobys” = Doing laundry.
In Singapore there is a MRT station named Dhoby Ghaut:
Dhoby Ghaut in the late 1800s:


This is what was called a soogie pad in the Coast Guard:


Soogie power was something like Comet or Ajax brand powder.
That’s it, I was wondering if anyone would twig on the word.
Dobie dust = laundry powder
Hence “Dobie Pads?”

Cheers,
Earl
We used to use bristle brushes and abrasive powder, didn’t have high tech dobie pads
But the effect was the same. I have seen engine rooms I could walk in with socks on my feet and they would be barely soiled at the end of the walk, if I chose to do so. This was accomplished by wipers striving to get ahead and become oilers. It was tedious work but the wipers learned the normal sounds and rhythm of the engine room. Once they became oilers they never forgot that, When a few became 3rd engineers they were invaluable,
For what it’s worth, the soogie powder we typically used was more along the lines of Trisodium Phosphate versus anything too caustic.
Yep we used tsp when we could get it but also stole from the stewards. 
This was the first “engineering” term I learned and was my very first job in an engine room. 1987 my first Chief Engineer was a WWII Merchant Marine veteran and my first day he assigned me to soogy the Main Engine. He told me cleaning the engine was only half the point. The other half was to learn what it sounded like so when something was off I would know if right away. Always remembered that lesson.
Back in the “good old days” ie. 1960s in The British India Steam Navigation Company, Yes the word “Soogy” was used every watch. Command to Indian sub continent man who spoke little or no English :- “Toom soogy bucket safcarro chota tail acha”. This was said as you pointed at a small deposit of oil on the grey painted engine room plates. Hopefully off they went and got a bucket of hot water in which they had dissolved some brown soft soap and a squirt of “Gamlin” degreaser. Armed with a mop and the galvanised bucket which had a perforated squeeze cone at one side, they would happily spend most of the watch going round all the engineroom with mop and rag cleaning the plates and bulkheads until the space looked like an ice cream factory.
This was a Steam Ship of course!!!
Oh! the stories I have?
“Soogee” apparently is the correct spelling, the most common anyway.
Also "Soogee-moogie being the cleaning product.
Noun[edit]
soogee ( uncountable )
Synonyms[edit]
Verb[edit]
soogee ( third-person singular simple present soogees , present participle soogeeing , simple past and past participle soogeed )
- (nautical, transitive) To clean with soogee.
We also used Varsol combined with TSP and a little toluene; might be a cure for Covid.
Memories of Seacunnies, Casals,serangs , I think the last was the only one I got right. The second steward was called the Butler. I forgot the bandarees.
Ah, the good old days … nothing on this planet except freon cuts oil like Gamlin!
Used lots of Gamlin back in the day…Do they still make it?
Not sure about the Gamlen burner / carbon cleaner. Nasty stuff the smell of which I remember 40 years later. Sickly sweet and chemically.
Seen a wiper go into convulsions after failing to use gloves. Never saw him again after we landed him. It was that or the trichlorethane degreaser 
