Employees of Stálsmiðjan Framtak performed a feat of strength during the repairs. Kristjana Guðbrandsdóttir and Kristján Kristjánsson spoke with Árni Pálsson about the project.
It was between Christmas and New Year's last year that Lagarfoss, a ship owned by Eimskip, had an engine failure while sailing between Iceland and America. A mist detector stopped the engine, and upon inspection, a crack was found in one of the crankpins.
The ship was towed to port, and it was then determined whether the repairs could be carried out here in Iceland. "It was really the only option, as it doesn't make much sense to tow a ship across the entire Atlantic in January. We at Stálsmiðjan Framtak, in consultation with Eimskip, started looking for a new crankshaft," says Árni, and fortunately, it turned out that such a shaft was available at the MaK factory in Germany—in fact, it was the only one in stock. He says the factory responded well to the request to get the shaft to Iceland.
The engine in Lagarfoss is a MaK 9M43C. It's a 9-cylinder, 12,000-horsepower engine, and it's incredibly heavy, weighing around 130 tonnes. "We knew it would require a lot of planning to get the engine block off the crankshaft, and we started right after the New Year, on January 5th. We began by removing the top of the engine and its internal components. The engine was located under the container deck, and we had to lift the 80-tonne block up by 2.5 meters to get the crankshaft out from under it." To lift such a weight, four 25-tonne chain hoists had to be rented from abroad. A special trolley was then built to slide the shaft out from under the engine and into the cargo hold.
Árni says that probably 30 people worked on the project in one way or another, and on January 24th, the new shaft was hoisted aboard and slid under the engine for assembly. "The work wasn't just about assembly; of course, we took the opportunity to overhaul the engine parts.
Sturlaugur and co. took on the overhaul of the turbine. It went very well, and on February 6th, we were able to lower the engine back into place, and it was started up four days later," says Árni. After the overhaul and repairs, Lagarfoss was able to leave port on February 12th.
But what happened? "Nobody knows, and it's unheard of for a crankshaft in an engine like this to break. It has been sent to Germany for investigation. But this crack was visible on the crankpin. One might assume it was a defect, but that remains to be seen," says Árni.
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Árni says this was the largest project Stálsmiðjan Framtak has ever undertaken, although they have handled extensive repairs on Reykjafoss and Skógarfoss. "It's significant that Eimskip kept the repairs here in Iceland and that we were entrusted with the project. It takes many different ways of thinking and skills to tackle such a large project, and we have a good team that approached it with resourcefulness and positivity."