Bosch Govenor Failure 12 valve mtu 183 te 92

The MTU engines you speak of are many years old, thus a latent defect is unlikely. That said, RPM Diesel in Ft. Lauderdale, FL services these engines, and is an MTU dealer. Also, Florida Detroit Diesel-Allison in Ft. Lauderdale has a marine division which supports these engines. Perhaps they can provide support services to evaluate the matter.

By the way, the spelling of the governor manufacturer is, "Bosch".

An additional aspect, and perhaps most importantly, why was the engine fuel shut down mechanism ineffective? Had it functioned properly the engine might have been prevented from destroying itself.

I have corrected the OP's spelling. Thanks Ron.

I understand about the hours of service, I was referring to chronological time since new / placed into service, which are typically the legal criteria for statute of limitations issues regarding latent defect cases.

High idle only applies if the governor is functional. The sequence of events described suggests it failed.

Don't blame the victim before all the operational information is available. Without knowing the location and circumstances, it is fair to state that once the operator determined that local control of the engine was lost, placing the gear in neutral was not an ureasonable action. The operator had no way of determining that a (very rare) governor failure had occurred and control of the boat was his highest priority.

Again, that option depends on how many people were on the boat, where it was and the level of risk of leaving the helm to a passenger in order to troubleshoot a very unusual condition on a running engine. Determining the problem, and knowing that removing the load (taking it out of gear) would lead to a runaway requires a level of specialist knowledge that may be beyond most operators. All that also assumes an intimate knowledge of diesel engine governor operation, the location and appearance of manual stop devices and the risks involved.

My take on this is that the OP is not looking for warranty service, he is trying to get the insurer to accept that fact that a mechanical failure lead to the destruction of an engine after taking reasonable actions to prevent what might have been a greater loss.

so, did it "run away" or go overspeed ? would effect Ins |Co analysis.

I think the OP made it perfectly clear ...

The throttle had no effect on engine speed while the gear was clutched in. That means the governor was delivering the amount of fuel required to produce the power required to turn the engine 2050 rpm under the propeller load.

When the load of the propeller was removed, the same amount of fuel was sufficient to allow the engine to overspeed or "runaway" which in this case are the same thing.

A runaway is an uncontrolled increase in engine speed- usually to destruction- beyond that selected or limited by the governor . An overspeed is an rpm beyond the maximum permitted by the manufacturer. A runaway typically, and very rapidly, results in an overspeed condition.

Anytime you lose control of an engines fuel regulation can lead to catastrophic results, shutdown flaps are installed in the inlet manifolds for the immediate closing of the sir supply, were these fitted and or operational.

My all time favourite emergency stop is a C02 Fire extinguisher sprayed into the air inlet, this will stop the nastiest engine if it can stop the combustion before some rotating part decides to stop shaking hands with its friends.

To have a governor failure in the full fuel position when up to that point everything has been running well is very rare in my experience.

As this case shows, it doesn't require the failure to occur in the "full fuel" position. As you know, it takes very little fuel for an unloaded diesel to accelerate to high idle. If the governor failed and is unable to reduce fuel flow at that rpm, destructive overspeed will quickly occur.

Since this failure happened with the governor delivering the amount of fuel required to maintain 2050 rpm under propeller load, when the load was removed the fuel delivery rate was far more than enough to cause a destructive overspeed.

It doesn't always work. We once spent an hour and more than 30 20lb extinguishers trying to stop a 2 stroke medium speed OP (diesel electric) that was running steadily at about 350 rpm. Shutting the inlet ducting doors only caused the downstream duct to implode and leak enough air to keep the engine running. We just kept adding lube oil until we got a CO2 truck on the dock and literally flooded the engine with gas and snow.

The last 6 words are obviously key in that second quoted statement.

I have seen 16v 396's run at full no load RPM with little more than the amount of rack they had at start.

Insurance will not cover. Mechanical breakdown in this matter is not covered according to a broker friend of mine in the marine insurance business. However if the boat ended up on the rocks and sank then insurance would cover the costs according to him unless it could be proven the breakdown etc.

They do seem to be available as recond units. http://www.rockanddirt.com/attachments-for-sale/MTU-FRIEDRICHSHAFEN/12V183 TE TB/invnum=5374673

Isn't that MTU block the same as the MB OM444? Lots of them used in machinery. Buy a running takeout and swap the marinization bits maybe.

I am pretty sure they are the same, I am also under the impression there are engines with a MAN Valve cover that are actually the same too.