Full Power and Economy Trials, Continued

Chapter 2—ADMINISTRATION, SUPERVISION, AND TRAINING It is important to make careful inspections and tests of equipment and items of machinery that may cause difficulties during full power opera- tion, since it is possible that unknown defects or conditions may go undetected during operation at fractional powers—the normal operating con- dition of the ship most of the time. Before a trial run is made, the main engines should be inspected to make sure that the power output of the individual cylinders is equal; this ensures a balanced, smooth-operating engine, at maximum speed and power. Equal load distribu- tion between the individual cylinders depends on the following factors being as nearly equal as possible for all cylinders. 1. Compression pressures. 2. Fuel injection timing. 3. Quantity and quality of fuel injected. 4. Firing pressures. 5. Inlet valve timing and lift. 6. Exhaust valve timing and lift. 7. Exhaust gas temperatures. A common practice among many com- manding officers, when making full power trials, is first to bring the ship up to a speed of one or more knots below the trial run speed of the ship and then turn the control of the speed (except in cases of emergency nature) over to the engineer officer. The control engineroom, under the super- vision of the engineer officer, brings the speed up slowly, depending upon the conditions of the plant, until the specified speed has been reached. 2-53