Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Diesel Engines for Dummies!

Yesterday, thanks to my nearest and dearest Uncle Bob (love you Bobby!!), Scott and I attended a Mack Boring "Diesel Training for the Boat Owner" seminar in Wauconda, IL.  Everyone keeps telling us that diesel engines are "really quite simple" and relatively "straightforward" pieces of machinery and after tinkering around with one I beg to differ.  However, the class - from 8am to 5pm - was incredibly dense and full of great information that we are both still processing.  The first half of class we learned about combustion, engine cooling mechanisms, troubleshooting techniques, oil and diesel additives and all sorts of good stuff.  The second half we got to actually tinker around with an engine; bleed the air out of the system, check the air filter, check the transmission oil (often neglected by boat owners) and see where everything we learned about in the first half of class actually lived on the real life engine.

It was super cool and we met some great fellow boat owners who we are sure to either meet up with again here in Chicago or cross paths with on our journey out to sea!

We definitely learned a great deal and even came home smelling of diesel exhaust - just like REAL engine mechanics.  That's gotta give us some street cred, right?

Love,

Brittany and Scott

No comments:

Post a Comment

Have something to say? Feel free to comment! We love to hear from you! Unfortunately, slow internet combined with three little ones means I might not be able to comment back. But, either way, I love to hear from you all. Note: Negative comments with no purpose but to antagonize will be deleted with out a second thought.