Hi Guys,
I have a vexing problem.
We are experiencing high
fuel burn. We usually burn about .4 gallons an hour but yesterday we burned about 1.1 gallons an hour! We ran at our normal cruising speed and used our normal
RPM range. We had adverse
current of about 1 to 1.5 knots for about 3 hours during an 11 hour day. The rest was going with the
current or in slack.
We recently had a new bottom put on and the prop just had propspeed applied. Also, we calibrated our
fuel tank by sucking down the
fuel to the point the pickup stopped sucking in fuel then calibrated the tank by pouring in 5 gallons at a time - we have a Hart Tank
Tender. We really don't make any smoke at all - maybe just a puff of white smoke at startup but she seems to be burning very clean.
Here are the things I have looked at:
1) My initial assumption was we have a crack in the tank - Upon
inspection of the
bilge there is no evidence of a crack. The
bilge under the tank is dry, there is no
diesel smell, and our
oil bilge pads (which sit in the only place where the
diesel could go) has no evidence of diesel smell either.
2) Leaking past rings - we just had our
oil inspected by Blackstone before leaving. There is no evidence of combustibles or
coolant in the oil.
I'm out of ideas? Maybe fouled injectors? Bad timing of the valves?