[Shop-talk] diesel fuel question

[alfuller194 at gmail.com]

Eric – it sounds like the system ‘worked’ [albeit in a perverse way…]. The testing should illuminate any weaknesses in the system and allow for fixing that before it’s really needed. Luckily you were able to persist!

 

----------------

All the best,

 

Al Fuller

 

From: Shop-talk <shop-talk-bounces at autox.team.net> On Behalf Of Eric Russell via Shop-talk
Sent: Friday, April 24, 2020 11:27 AM
To: shop-talk at autox.team.net
Subject: Re: [Shop-talk] diesel fuel question

 

Since we've drifted a little bit off-topic (and we likely have too much free time now), here's my story about emergency generators. At the time I was working (RN) night shift in a hospital ICU. Every Tuesday about 6am the hospital would test their emergency generator. It was supposed to be a quick blink from regular power to emergency power. Except in our ICU (and only the ICU) the power would be off for 3-5 minutes! Not fun when you have patients on ventilators that did not have battery back-up. It got so bad I would remind my staff to stand by with flashlights and manual Ambu bags every Tuesday morning. 

I complained to the engineering department but they insisted the power would only be off for a few seconds at most. I finally convinced the chief engineer to come sit in our unit on a Tuesday morning. He did, the power went off for a full 5 minutes and the color drained from his face. Whatever was the problem finally got fixed. 

Eric Russell
Mebane, NC 

 

On 4/24/2020 10:30 AM, Al Fuller via Shop-talk wrote:

As regards the comment you made below that the generators get exercised 30 minutes a week: Please keep in mind that its sounds like you meant to say the diesel engines get exercised [as opposed to the generators]. 

 

The difference is the generator set also includes the transfer switch, wiring and other components. I had one client that fired up the diesel weekly, but when a wind storm blew down the power lines, the facility was down for a week while they tried to locate a new transfer switch. It turned out the building housed a lot more people and equipment than when the generator set was first specified and the switch set couldn’t support the load.  It was very frustrating to have a working diesel generator, but unable to power the building!





 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://autox.team.net/pipermail/shop-talk/attachments/20200424/7287f004/attachment.htm>