Terry Streeter wrote: > Peter Stockdale asked: >> As a non boatowner I am perplexed ! >> Is "neutral" not a more or less a universal feature of boat >> engines these days. >> Why is it therefore necessary to run ones engine in gear to >> extract non propulsion power from it ? > > > AIUI, running an engine for long periods of time with no significant > loading can cause the bores to 'glaze'. An alternator does not provide > any real load for the engine to work against. This is supposed to be > bad for the engine, causing poor compression?? >
I had a long chat with an engineer from Beta marine about this. He worked for many years for Lister and glazing was quite a common problem; since he had been at Beta he rarely saw/heard about the problem. He said that it was unlikely that any modern diesel would have a problem because tick-over was so much faster than the old engines. However, his advice was to be sure to use a Grade C oil like the one that Lister sell. I found a local source (Jannell) and have never used anything else. WE now have 4,000 hours and I would estimate that a third of that is (getting less as we no longer live aboard) has been the engine running out of gear for charging/generating purposes. The local 'expert' on our mooring told me I would 'ruin' the engine within six months if I didn't run it in gear when charging; I decided to take Beta's advice and ignore him. Cheers -- Will Chapman Save Our Waterways www.SaveOurWaterways.org.uk
