System of Water Vehicle Power Plant Remote Condition Monitoring

Abstract

Remote condition monitoring of water vehicles plays an important role in preventing potentially very expensive marine incidents and ensuring maximum efficiency of a ship's operation and reliability with minimum maintenance downtime and repair costs. Concept of the condition-based approach to maintenance is today's best practise, and it is becoming increasingly important to move from planned maintenance to condition-based maintenance, to reduce the increasingly high cost of maintaining a modern fleet. Onboard and remote monitoring is now an essential part of condition-based maintenance process to obtain the good quality data, correct analysis, and effective counteractive actions necessary for such an approach, and article presents the water vehicle power plant monitoring model developed by authors. Considered approach, coupled with preventive maintenance, saves shipowners time and money through early diagnosis of component failure or excess wear. Power plant of water vehicle comprises far more than just an engine with its auxiliary equipment but also other main propulsion blocks – in particular, thrusters. The result was the development of the Water Vehicle Condition Monitoring (WVCM) system, which enables to closely examine water vehicle equipment performance. A WVCM system comprises the following installed onboard: accelerometers, pressure and temperature transmitters, oil, fuel and exhaust monitoring units and a torque measurement system.