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At the yacht, I couldn’t remove the oil dipstick from my 2005 Nanni Diesel N2.14. It comes out about four centimetres, then jams. It won’t rotate either. I called several marine service companies; only one agreed to help.
Their €202 fee covered a visit to the marina, 45 minutes’ work and a replacement dipstick costing €106. Two weeks later, an older mechanic and his assistant arrived with the new part. They inspected the engine, turned the shaft and pulled the dipstick. Their conclusion: the engine sits in such a confined space that the dipstick had never been withdrawn at the right angle and had bent slightly. Eventually, the bend caught the crankshaft, which drives the pistons, and the crankshaft won. Apparently, it had twisted the dipstick into an unnatural curve. The only recommended way to remove it was to lift the entire engine out. Perhaps — only perhaps — something could then be done. The unofficial option was brute force. Either way, the engine couldn’t be used while the dipstick touched the crankshaft. They left me the spare part and went away.
I asked the marina team what lifting the engine would cost. Crane work alone, if I disconnected and reconnected everything, would be three hours at €80: roughly €250. A complete job would take at least twenty hours, about €1,600. But they had no time: launch was a month away, in April, and the schedule was full.
Back aboard, I tried force. I passed a mooring line through the dipstick ring, climbed onto the deck and put my full weight on it. The ring straightened; the dipstick didn’t move a centimetre.
I don’t know how to solve this. If anyone has any advice at all, I’d be enormously grateful.
#maintenance
Their €202 fee covered a visit to the marina, 45 minutes’ work and a replacement dipstick costing €106. Two weeks later, an older mechanic and his assistant arrived with the new part. They inspected the engine, turned the shaft and pulled the dipstick. Their conclusion: the engine sits in such a confined space that the dipstick had never been withdrawn at the right angle and had bent slightly. Eventually, the bend caught the crankshaft, which drives the pistons, and the crankshaft won. Apparently, it had twisted the dipstick into an unnatural curve. The only recommended way to remove it was to lift the entire engine out. Perhaps — only perhaps — something could then be done. The unofficial option was brute force. Either way, the engine couldn’t be used while the dipstick touched the crankshaft. They left me the spare part and went away.
I asked the marina team what lifting the engine would cost. Crane work alone, if I disconnected and reconnected everything, would be three hours at €80: roughly €250. A complete job would take at least twenty hours, about €1,600. But they had no time: launch was a month away, in April, and the schedule was full.
Back aboard, I tried force. I passed a mooring line through the dipstick ring, climbed onto the deck and put my full weight on it. The ring straightened; the dipstick didn’t move a centimetre.
I don’t know how to solve this. If anyone has any advice at all, I’d be enormously grateful.
#maintenance
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