[Jeroen]

I know not everybody is a fan of Facebook. I use it a lot though. Not for news, but to stay in touch with families and friends all over the world. It is a good places for hobbies en interest as well.

One of the interesting features I found is the so called “Events”. Once Facebook understands your sort of preferences it will start making suggestions as well. These days a lot of day trips to exhibitions, concerts, events and so come from Facebook. Very convenient.

I was very surprised to have Facebook suggest an event at a place I had never heard of. Not only was it very near to us, less than 16 km, it was also about one of my favourite topics; Diesel Engines. In fact, mainly marine diesels. Those of you that have followed me on the forum will recall I used to be a merchant marine engineer early on in my career. I sailed the seven seas, and a few oceans, for the first 10 years of my career. Made it to Chief Engineer.

So, naturally, I was interested and decided to take a little trip down diesel memory lane. Unfortunately, the weather was pretty awful, otherwise it would have been a nice ride on my bicycle. So I took the car.

This place is called the SHVP, or Stichting Historische Verbrandingsmotoren Papendrecht. Which means the Society for historical combustion engines in Papendrecht. The society was formed in 2012 by founder and owner Peter Reichwein. He started collecting engines in the early ‘80s. His hobby grew and grew and at some point in time he wanted to put it on display and the managed to find this location. Well over 30 engines, with a total weight of well over 250 tonnes. So they needed a pretty sturdy building at that!

Here the complete overview of their collection:




http://www.shvp.nl

The society is run entirely by volunteers, rangingfrom 35 to 85 years of age.

Currently 28 of the engines are in running order. Whereas the museum is open during the weekends they only have one or two “running days” per year. This weekend was one of them.

I arrived just before 10.00 o’clock. This guy had taken the opportunity to display some of his second hand goods on sale. I did rummage through some of the boxes, looking for tools. But did not find anything I need. I would never ever buy hoisting gear second hand. It is just not worth the risk. But he had plenty of it on sale and I saw some people buying some of the slings and chains.



Whereas normally the entry price is Euro 5 (slightly more expensive than a Star Bucks coffee), todays entry was free.

So let’s step inside:



Even though it was early it was already getting busy and soon the place would be bursting at the seams as you will see.

Let's look at some of the engines on display. This is a 1944 Werkspoor TM263, 150HP, 360rpm. It was build during the war.



An 1953 Industrie 4VD6A, 200HP, 320rpm



Another Industrie, this being a 2D4, 80HP, 600rpm, from 1953



All of these engines are from before my merchant navy era. But I have come across some of these engines, on old vintage ships. These engines were extremely well build and usually outlived the hull of any ship easily.



This was probably the piece de resistance of the whole collection. Another Werkspoor. It is a TMAB278 from 1954, 700HP, 350rpm. The famous Werkspoor mediumspeed TM410 was essentially derived from these sort of engines. And the infamous TM620 too.



Let’s have a look at some of the details. Here you can see the inlet and outlet rockers. Exhaust gas temperature.



Here what is known as the governor. The governor controls the rpm and or the power of the engine. These are fantastic little machines. All mechanical with internal hydraulics for closed loop automation.



Another view of the governor and you can see the turbo assembly, notably the air inlet filter.



Some more details. These engines are extremely photogenic. So much to see, so much detail, shiny bits, moving bits etc. These sort of engines, and anything bigger than these, will always have a valve attached on the cylinder head. The valve has two purposes. With the engine shut down, these valves are opened. Before the engine is started it is pre-lubricated and it is turned 360-720o by hand to ensure no cooling water has leaked into the cylinders. With the valve open no compression and any cooling water liquid would spout out! Also, it is used to connect a so called indicator tool. That is a special tool that allows the engineers to measure the power produced in each cylinder. This is what is known as indicated horsepower, so often these valves were called indicator valves.



Here what is known as a cylinder liner lubrication unit. Apart from looking gorgeous, it has an import function. The cylinder liner has around its circumference several little holes. This unit, thought steel pipe lines is hooked up to these. It pushes a little drop of oil out into the cilinder for every so many rotations of the crankshaft. So it ensures lubrication of the piston rings.



As duty engineer you had to keep checking the proper operation of this little machine. You can see the oil drops through those little glas gauges on the top.

It is driven through a simple ratchet system of the main shaft.



Here a similar lubricator and the mechanical drive system.





Early on in my career as merchant navy engineer one day, whilst on leave, I got an urgent call from the crew department. At the time we were living in Brighton UK. One of their ships, the SmitLLoyd 61 was in Aberdeen, Scotland with major engine damage. They had sacked the Chief engineer and could I please, please head over straight away.

This particular Smit Lloyd vessel was a supply vessel for the oil offshore industry. In those days, early 80’s, lots of offshore activity in the North sea. This vessel had two Bolnes engines. V-16s, two stroke. With both a turbo and a scavenging piston too. (an earlier version is on display here at the museum too).

What had happened is that the engineer whilst on duty did not check the cilinder lubrication unit properly. Which meant the port engine had been running with no cylinder lubrication. This meant we had to lift 16 cylinder heads, pull 16 piston, pull 16 cylinder liners, check and replace whatever was damaged beyond proper specification and rebuild the engine. The company had the parts send over with two Bolnes specialist to give us a hand. Still, it took us four days of working 18 hours a day to fix it all. Big job!

The Netherlands had quite a diesel manufacturing industrie, with various well established brands in the early to mid 1900s. Industrie, Brons, Stork, Werkspoor, Bolnes, Kromhout to name a few. They are all represented here with at least one of their engines.

I sailed with Werkspoor, Bolnes and Industrie engines. Both as main engines as well as auxiliary engines.

Another very interesting engine was this MAN engine. It was build in 1917 and powered a German submarine in the first world war. Blohm & Voss build about 250 of these engines, but this is the only running unit in the world. It produces 430HP at 375rpm. During the second world war it was transported to the Netherlands where it powered a generator.

It has a very special fuel injection system by means of high pressure air. The high pressure air is produced at the back of the engine with some dedicated kit bolted on instead of a regular cylinder head.







Overlooking the top of the MAN:



Here you get a good view of this special high pressure air compressor arrangement. I do not think I have ever come across this on regular marine applications. Must be specific to submarines.



The museum has lots of spare parts and some very well equipped workshops



This little tool is used to test the fuel injectors



Well equipped workshop, lots of tools and machinery. I need one of each for my garage!



Some electronic tools too. Never had those in my merchant navy days!



These guys are building a similar little electrical measuring instruments as I do



It was getting more busy. Very easy going, you were allowed to roam freely, climb on top of the engines



I had chatted with some of the attendees. Many had some sort of engineering background. Quite a few had worked in the various engine factories at the time. And of course, quite a few former marine engineers about.



Another close up of one of the big engines. You can see the injectors, bolted down in the middle of each cylinder head

[Jeroen]

It was getting pretty busy by now. A few more impressions





This is a Bolnes 1958, 2L, 100HP at 430rpm. It is very similar to the engine I sailed with. Ours were a lot bigger, but the basic design is very similar.

Two stroke with only one valve in the cylinder head.



Here you see the Bolnes from the side. Notice how tall it is. These engines have a so called cross head arrangement. So the crankshaft is connected to the cross head by means of a corned. The cross head goes up and down and also acts as a scavenging pump for the inlet air. The piston is attached to the cross head with the piston rod. It gives these engines their typical tall look.



It appeared as if there were laths all over this place. Definitely need one like these!



Very traditional at these sort of events; a choir singing seamen songs! Good fun.



Some more details and some more gorgeous looking engines





The society does all the repairs, maintenance, overhaul and rebuilding themselves. There are still a few engines half way into their rebuild



Close inspection by a member of the public.



It was really nice. People climbing all over these engines, talking, gesturing.







This could have been taking in an actual ship engine room looking down!



By eleven o’clock this place was packed and they were starting up various engines, one at a time. Let it run for 5-10 minutes and then move on to the next one. A very tentative a highly critical crowd. Most of us watching used to start these engines in a distant past.





Some more details. No electronics on these engines. All pretty much analogue!



These engines, although pretty indestructible, did require some attention when running. In particular oiling all the mechanical bits. Every rocker arm has one of these little oil jar. Regular checking was required to keep it topped up.



The Werkspoor about to be started



A shot of air, inject fuel and it runs again. The crowd goes wild!



Some more impressions





It was real busy, lots of interest!



Final shot:

[Aditya]

Thread moved out from the Assembly Line. Thanks for sharing!

[superbad]

Fascinating stuff indeed. I particularly liked how you interspersed the technical bits with anecdotes from your life. Made it pretty interesting.
Could you give a ballpark torque figure of these engines? I'm curious, they all must be atleast 500 Nm plus. Also why is the horsepower capacity vis-a-vis the displacement lesser than the usual car diesel engine? Is it because of the low rpm?

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by superbad

Could you give a ballpark torque figure of these engines? I'm curious, they all must be atleast 500 Nm plus. Also why is the horsepower capacity vis-a-vis the displacement lesser than the usual car diesel engine? Is it because of the low rpm?

Lets take the Werkspoor as an example: 700 HP at 350 rpm.

That gives a torque of: 14.242 Nm!!!

Remember the relation Torque is (power / rpm). At a given power output low rpm gets you high Torque!


See http://wentec.com/unipower/calculators/power_torque.asp

[FINTAIL]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

It was getting pretty busy by now. A few more impressions

You didn't find any ALCo 251's did you? Easily my favorite.

[tharian]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

It was getting pretty busy by now. A few more impressions

Any videos of these engines starting up? Nothing beats a mammoth diesel waking up lazily from its slumber.

[Kosfactor]

Look Ma! No Plastic!! Thanks for sharing.

What is the oldest engine you found there?

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by tharian

Any videos of these engines starting up? Nothing beats a mammoth diesel waking up lazily from its slumber.

Have a look, at 0;46 they are starting the Werkspoor and many more!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4MKi4OyvIw

Originally Posted by Kosfactor

What is the oldest engine you found there?

Remarkably, it is that MAN from the submarine, from 1917. Given that the first Diesel prototype ran at 1894 a remarkable achievement in the space of just over twenty years from first inception to such a large Diesel Engine!

Jeroen

[Kosfactor]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Remarkably, it is that MAN from the submarine, from 1917. Given that the first Diesel prototype ran at 1894 a remarkable achievement in the space of just over twenty years from first inception to such a large Diesel Engine!

Jeroen

Your post made me read through the history of diesels once again, interesting to note that MAN is perhaps the first diesel engine manufacturer under license from Rudolf diesel himself. That must be a 2 stroke diesel I guess.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Kosfactor

Your post made me read through the history of diesels once again, interesting to note that MAN is perhaps the first diesel engine manufacturer under license from Rudolf diesel himself. That must be a 2 stroke diesel I guess.

No, it is a four stroke diesel!

I found this, but all in German I am afraid:

http://www.gaswerk-augsburg.de/oelmaschine.html

Here the story about how Rudolf went about it. His initial essay on the diesel principle contained some errors. These were pointed out to him, by various of his contempories in the field of engineering and thermodynamics.

Rudolf had to adapt his thinking, but was reluctant to do so, believing it would put negative sentiments on his design. So he tried to hide the necessary changes. These days we read about scientist hiding and manipulating their research. Rudolf was no different. Although, his overal vision was spot on and of course he managed to actually license his work/vision!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory...nal_Heat_Motor

Jeroen

[kraft.wagen]

Interesting place indeed. Maybe we should plan our next meet there. The museum is open everyday or on open days?

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by kraft.wagen

Interesting place indeed. Maybe we should plan our next meet there. The museum is open everyday or on open days?

It has limited opening times, only on Tuesdays 13.30 - 17.00

For groups they make special arrangements any day, to prior calling.

The smallest group would be 10 people. Cost Euro 12.50 per person. For that you get tea and coffee and a guided tour of 2,5 hour.

Jeroen

[sandeepmohan]

Originally Posted by FINTAIL

You didn't find any ALCo 251's did you?

Isn't this on our American derived WDM2 locomotives? Our 4 stroke diesels use a derivative of this model. Sadly; they are no longer manufactured.

We are in this situation where the world wants to go green and the internal combustion engine is under threat. However; I do not ever see a scenario where you can kill the diesel engine. The combustion cycle is more efficient than anything out there. It is a trade off. I pollute more than anyone would like but I get a lot done by burning less fossil fuel.

Thanks for sharing Jeroen.

[landcruiser123]

Wow, great thread! Rating it 5*.

Diesel engines always have a special place in my heart as they power the beasts of burden- all commercial vehicles. From Marine engines to Semi trucks, these engines are the hearts of the workhorses in our community. I'm glad to see there's a museum celebrating the machines which made our lives easier. <3 I could not be a marine engineer due to my eyesight, else I'd been having one of these monsters near me at work.

Thanks for the informative thread and great pictures.