Boatnerd Discussion Forum

The Fairbanks Morse engines used by the U.S. Coast Guard and Algona were famous for crankcase explosions. When I was on Mackinaw we had several. Fortunately nobody was injured, but can make a mess of an engine. The most common cause was a hole in a piston, or more often lube oil being diluted with fuel oil. This is why we always checked the lube oil viscosity on the engines once a watch.

Guest wrote:If I remember correctly the Ralph Misener had a crank-case explosion in the early 1980s that killed the chief engineer.

Unfortunately 2 crewmembers lost their lives in that incident August 12, 1980, aboard the Ralph Misener at Port Alfred, the first lost of life came 2 days after the explosion, the second 17 days later.
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The ship has 6 engines; 3 forward, 3 aft. The report I read says the fire occurred in a generator in the aft engine room. It damaged a switchboard "preventing the transmissionof electricity to other machinery, including the propulsion motors". There was no mention od an explosion. The cause of the fire is unknown.

must have been a big explosion.
i saw a locomotive with a emd explode.
big bang and a ball of fire.
i'm sure the ships engine was a lot larger.

If I remember correctly the Ralph Misener had a crank-case explosion in the early 1980s that killed the chief engineer.

One report I read about this weeks cruise ship that had the engine room fire said that the engine split open and burning oil spewed around.
I wonder if that may have been en internal crankcase explosion.
In a huge crankcase full of hot oil vapor could an explosion occur?
Has this happened before?