Sulzer

30 years ago I was one of a three man team holding a contract for the US Coast Guard to inspect icebreakers
we used infra-red and ultrasonic instruments to inspect electrical and mechanical gear--ie--motor control boxes, electrical wiring, all rotating elements, etc
we spent a week on WAGB 4--Glacier following its return from McMurdo base
flew to San Francisco and journeyed to Portland -home berth- on the ship

the Polar Star and Polar Sea are sister ships built by Lockheed Shipyard--Seattle--and problems with these breakers were primary reason Lockheed declared bankruptcy

the Polar series were interesting---each had 6 Fairbanks Morse Alco four stroke marine diesels coupled to dc generators
each Alco produced 3000 shp

but 3 Pratt Whitney JT4 turbines were also included each rated 20,000 continuous shp for 60,000 shp turbine output

Alco fuel consumption at about 50 percent demand would consume fuel complement of 1.2 million gal in 3 months

the JT4 turbines would go thru same volume in 14 days

part of an ice breakers mission to McMurdo was to replenish base fuel supply
600,000 to 1 million gallon off load
the Polar series actually held 1.5 million gallons but a reserve was always necessary

so where does Sulzer fit into this thread---?

the polar class proved to be huge headaches--and when the Coast Guard commisioned the successor generation--the Healy--also home ported in Seattle-
four 12 cylinder four stroke Sulzer diesels were selected for propulsion--
the Healy has proved highly reliable--


video link is Sulzer operation in 1930's---highpoint is Schiess linear planer which is impressive by todays standards

Sulzer in the 193s - YouTube

Thanks for posting this.

A number of years ago SULZER did a wonderful book titled : From the Mountains to the seas. The Sulzer Diesel Engine.

Fascinating film. I once worked with an ex " Sulzer " engineer. He was a really well educated and clued up guy. I remember him telling me that he'd been sent to install a Diesel engine in a ship being built in a British shipyard. He said he'd earned what the British workers were earning for a week's work by about 3.00 on Monday afternoon !

He just shook his head at the British plumbing in his rented house. I said to him " Well what do you have in Switzerland " ? He said " Intelligence ".

Lovely looking planing machine. I think I can make out " Scheiss-Dorries " on the bridge piece. Both still in business as far as I know.

Regards Tyrone.

The manufacturer's name cast into the planer bridge looks like Schiess-Defries to me. A Google image search does show a number of large to very large machine tools bearing the Schiess-Defries name, but they're mostly vertical boring mills.

Hi john, well you're right again. In my defence I was viewing the film on my IPad without my reading glasses. To be honest I'd never heard of " Schiess-Defries " but I thought I had heard of a later tie up between " Schiess " and " Dorries " so I jumped to an incorrect conclusion.

A brief viewing of the Internet revealed the " Schiess-Defries " had a large factory in Düsseldorf until the Royal Air Force came calling during the 1939-45 war.

Regards Tyrone.

JHOLLAND1 said:

the Polar Star and Polar Sea are sister ships built by Lockheed Shipyard--Seattle--and problems with these breakers were primary reason Lockheed declared bankruptcy

the Polar series were interesting---each had 6 Fairbanks Morse Alco four stroke marine diesels coupled to dc generators
each Alco produced 3000 shp

but 3 Pratt Whitney JT4 turbines were also included each rated 20,000 continuous shp for 60,000 shp turbine output

Alco fuel consumption at about 50 percent demand would consume fuel complement of 1.2 million gal in 3 months

the JT4 turbines would go thru same volume in 14 days

part of an ice breakers mission to McMurdo was to replenish base fuel supply
600,000 to 1 million gallon off load
the Polar series actually held 1.5 million gallons but a reserve was always necessary

so where does Sulzer fit into this thread---?

the polar class proved to be huge headaches--and when the Coast Guard commisioned the successor generation--the Healy--also home ported in Seattle-
four 12 cylinder four stroke Sulzer diesels were selected for propulsion--
the Healy has proved highly reliable--

Click to expand...

Our tax dollars at work....no holding the contractor to the contract to deliver a design that meets the specifications, and fuel consumption, uptime reliability.

In Lockheeds defense, most government contracts list unrealistic, always confusing specifications that are often conflicting or otherwise impossible to achieve in the real world. Plus, they are usually based on the cutting edge technology of 50 years ago that has long since been abandoned by the rest of the industry. They usually get just exactly what they specify.

Comparing a Sulzer engine to an Alco diesel is an interesting comparison. The Alco engines were last designed in the 1950's, and were likely the "251" series. I went to service training on the 251 Alco engines when Alco still built them in the Auburn, NY plant. The Alco 251 used a block fabricated by welding. It was a well proven engine for railroad use, and was used a lot for stationary and offshore power, and to some extent for marine propulsion. It was a reliable engine, but 1950's design.

I was in the ALCO plant at Auburn, NY for about a week for the training in 1977 or thereabouts, and as far as I know, Alco engines continued to be produced there into the 90's by Bombardier. I can say that ALCO did have the machine tools to produce the 251 engines that were on a par with what Sulzer showed in their film. ALCO had large Ingersoll planer mills and some early CNC machining centers to machine the blocks. They were purchasing the castings for the heads and liners, and the forgings for the rods and crankshafts, but machining them in the Auburn plant. We saw it all being done. The injection equipment at that time was American Bosch, not any real difference from the systems Sulzer would have used from Bosch in Germany at that same time. Single pump per cylinder and pintle type injectors.

Pistons came from Mahle, a German firm, and were forged aluminum as I recall. Bearings were shell type, and came from "Clevite". ALCO built their own turbos.

As I stated, there was likely not all that much difference between an Alco 251 series engine and a Sulzer engine, unless we know the operating speed and number of cylinders of each engine. ALCO 251's were always built in a "vee" configuration. Sulzer may well have furnished 'in-line' engines, slower turning, larger pistons, lower piston speeds. The Sulzers may well have had better fuel economy at partial loads, and better overload capacity than the ALCO engines.

At some point, Alco engines (the last fragment of American Locomotive Company, hence the "ALCO" name) was sold and merged under the umbrella of a firm which also had taken over the Fairbanks-Morse engine production. Production, if I am not mistaken, moved to somewhere in Texas. Whether that firm updated the 251 design or really had their hearts in producing the 251's is another question. F-M had the rights to the 4 stroke Pielstick engines, and had actually furnished some Pielstick diesels to the US Navy for main engines. With the shuffling of ownerships, the Pielsticks may have become somewhat redundant, since the ALCO 251 was a 4 stroke medium speed diesel and could be built in various cylinder configurations.

I am sure the US government handed Lockheed a specification calling for the Alco engines and DC drive. This was basic and proven technology, albeit from WWII. Similarly, the US Coast Guard had an icebreaker on the Great Lakes called the "Mackinac". She came out during WWII (if I remember right), and had the opposed piston Fairbanks Morse diesels and used the DC generators and motors for propulsion. I think the Mackinac had something like 4 F-M engines in her, and the generators could be paralleled so all the engines powered all the screws. The Mackinac gave something like 50 years of good service icebreaking on the Lakes. Chances are the US Government stuck with what had worked well in an icebreaking vessel of some size, but had specified a four-stroke diesel engine (the F-M's being a two stroke engine).

The Sulzer engines may well use a cast semi-steel block, and may have also used computer modelling to design the engines (for combustion chambers, manifold flows, stress distribution in the working parts, etc). Sulzer may also be using more advanced AC-Inverter drive rather than the DC drive of the Polar class icebreakers.
I would not be surprised if Sulzer did not team up with ABB and/or Siemens to furnish the complete diesel-electric propulsion package with inverter drive and AC generators and AC propulsion motors. The diesel-DC drive system may be based on WWII or railroad technologies, and may have still relied on electromechanical controls (air operated contactors, coil/clapper type relays and contactors, etc). It may be a case of comparing "apples to oranges", but I tend to think that the US Government drew up specifications based on what they had experience with and what they had on file as a fairly standard thing. Then, there is the matter of trying to keep the business of supplying engines and propulsion equipment with US firms. This is getting harder to do. However, 'way back when', the US Navy did get into licensing agreements with the German diesel engine builder MAN, and used MAN (Maschinenfabrik Augsburg-Nurnburg) designs built in US Naval shipyards. Going abroad for diesel engine designs is nothing new with the US Navy, but buying main engines made overseas is something that they may have been trying to avoid, hence the use of the ALCO engines. When the ALCO diesels did not work out, the US Government knew it was time to look abroad. I am kind of surprised that G.E. did not get a shot at furnishing the engines, as they build well-proven 4 stroke diesels at the Erie works, and are furnishing diesel-AC propulsion systems (well proven in railroad service).

Joe,

Interesting to hear of your time at ALCO, I am envious! I see F-M are still advertising the '251' engines.

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To others,

Only a arm-chair commentator...I agree that the Alco and Sulzer engines in question are very different to one another.

The Alco is a comparatively small and high speed engine. An estimate of a Polar Star/Polar Sea 16 cylinder is 3,000hp (2,200kw), rpm 750-1200?, bore & stroke 9" x 10.5'? (229 x 267mm).

The Sulzer ZAV40S is an altogether different engine, a much larger, medium speed engine, 400mm x 560mm bore and stroke, about 510 rpm. The Healy's 12 cylinder engines are each rated at 8640kw (11,586bhp) according to Wikipedia.

BTW, Sulzer engines were often (in latter years, entirely) built by licencees. There is a chance that the Healy engines were built in the USA? For example, ALCO was once a Sulzer licencee.

Joe Michaels said:

..well proven engine for railroad use, and was used a lot for stationary and offshore power, and to some extent for marine propulsion. It was a reliable engine, but 1950's design.
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This was basic and proven technology, albeit from WWII.

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The diesel-DC drive system may be based on WWII or railroad technologies,

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Swiss rail.. .was utilizing these goods about two generations before US rail got into Diesel Electric.

Marine use is older than US rail use as well. Not only submarines, WWI onward, but closer yet to Icebreakers, were Cable ships that needed precise positioning.

The "Normandie", AFAIK, borrowed her much larger steam turbine & electric final-drive technology largely off the back of shore-based utility-mains power generation builders, had nothing close to the need for fine-grain power shifting for wiggling about as a Cable ship or Icebreaker has.

Funny how a perfectly formed chip from a giant planer can be so pleasing to the eye...

jmm03 said:

Funny how a perfectly formed chip from a giant planer can be so pleasing to the eye...

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I used to have one of a load of big planing chips that came off the job in an almost perfect love heart shape believe it or not. It'd be about 2.5" high by the same wide and about 5/8" deep by about 0.030" thick. Being a real romantic I took one home for my wife. I wouldn't say she was too impressed by my token of affection and managed to lose it when we next decorated her study !

Regards Tyrone.

digger doug said:

Our tax dollars at work....no holding the contractor to the contract to deliver a design that meets the specifications, and fuel consumption, uptime reliability.

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You got what you deserve
Just read some complaining on local magazines how US is not allowing "imports" on ice breakers.
We would happily sell you Azipods, Wärtsilä-Sulzer diesels, Diesel electric drivetrains or the whole ice breaker.

MattiJ said:

You got what you deserve
Just read some complaining on local magazines how US is not allowing "imports" on ice breakers.
We would happily sell you Azipods, Wärtsilä-Sulzer diesels, Diesel electric drivetrains or the whole ice breaker.

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Why would we doo that ?

You think we don't make any number of those items ?

It's obvious from post's past mine, that the main failure was from the top, some bureaucrat idjit messed up, and
there is no responsibility. with that crowd.

"Easily spending someone else's money"

digger doug said:

Why would we doo that ?

You think we don't make any number of those items ?

Click to expand...

Azipods I wouldn't be so sure, maybe Rolls-Royce makes em nowadays in states.

MattiJ said:

Azipods I wouldn't be so sure, maybe Rolls-Royce makes em nowadays in states.

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If they make large bow thrusters, they can easily copy the design.

No stranger to large machinery involving water and electrons (and hydrocarbons either).

I was writing partly tongue in cheek, partly from viewpoint at another side of atlantic.
Thanks to US protectionism ("Jones act" I believe) you end up with DC drives and 1.2 billion budget for the ice breaker that would be built for 150 million in here

Edit: take at any entertainment value whatever:
http://old.seattletimes.com/html/opinion/2028539288_mcgrathhornopedicebreakersxml.html?prmid=4748

And why it might be cheaper to build here: Depelopment costs.
Apparently U.S. has build one arctic ice breaker in last 40 years, whereas 60% of ALL operational ice breakers around world have been build in here and 80% of all ice breakers are designed here. Just take a look at the map, capital city of Finland is bit north of Alaska

The purpose of not allowing imports is to retain domestic capability to build strategic equipment.

And, Take a look at the icebreaker pics above in the thread, and then keep mentioning those "azipods"..... They'd last about 30 seconds on the hull of an icebreaker. .

JST said:

The purpose of not allowing imports is to retain domestic capability to build strategic equipment.

And, Take a look at the icebreaker pics above in the thread, and then keep mentioning those "azipods"..... They'd last about 30 seconds on the hull of an icebreaker. .

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First part makes sense.

Second part makes no sense whatever, you forgot to do your homework here
Azipods were developed for ice breakers at first place, leisurely cruise ships are later market. Probably something like 90% of operational ice breakers run azipods.

MattiJ said:

I was writing partly tongue in cheek, partly from viewpoint at another side of atlantic.
Thanks to US protectionism ("Jones act" I believe) you end up with DC drives and 1.2 billion budget for the ice breaker that would be built for 150 million in here

Edit: take at any entertainment value whatever:
http://old.seattletimes.com/html/opinion/2028539288_mcgrathhornopedicebreakersxml.html?prmid=4748

And why it might be cheaper to build here: Depelopment costs.
Apparently U.S. has build one arctic ice breaker in last 40 years, whereas 60% of ALL operational ice breakers around world have been build in here and 80% of all ice breakers are designed here. Just take a look at the map, capital city of Finland is bit north of Alaska

Click to expand...

Plenty of shipyards to weld up whatever hull needed, we seem to do pretty good
on aircraft carriers eh ?

D.C. drives ? Get real.

where does some of your north sea drilling drives come from ?
Both D.C. and that newfangled A.C. with inverter drives no less.
And off highway trucks (300 ton units) what do you think they have ?

So yes, we can weld steel, and wind motors, and design & build drives.