I am doing prelim work & will need an English speaking, knowledgeable & fully equipped shop for maintenance & repairs. Does such a thing exist in Sihanoukville and/or Phnum Penh?
Can anyone help? Anyone here driving or have stationary diesels?

many diesels used in KOW boats use diesels, as gasoline fumes are so explosive, should be pent of diesel mechanics in SNV

Hi,

I'm a retire marine engineer (diesels to 6000hp, steam to 35,000hp), but I don't work on other peoples equipment. Fully equipped shop in Cambodia, dream on. I have yet to see a repair manual in any shop in Cambodia. (When I would get on a new ship, the first thing I would do is go over all the repair manuals.)

In SKV there is only one shop I trust. Its across from the small market. They have millions of dollars in spare parts and the other shops come to them for parts. Over almost 5 years they have replaced every bearing under my LandMonster (at my request.) They are honest and always very busy. I have seen a lot of diesels being worked on there. They stand behind their work. Recently a mechanic fried the computer on a diesel van and they didn't have a replacement. They shipped the van (at their cost)($2000.us), to PP for a complete new computer/injection system. They could have told the owner that it was bad when they started. To me honesty is supreme. If you go in there ask for "Hang', and tell Hang that "Grandfather" sent you in. Hang speaks good English and is a great guy.

What kind of diesel(s) do you have? Just one or many? Running or not running?

A big thanks Sailorman. I am in the process of buying two diesel vehicles. Prolly Mitsu M40D or Toyota 1JZ or 2JZ. Also an old Land Rover Defender 90. Prolly go with he 1994+ mitsu Montero/Pajero. Can be had rather reasonably. Always the factor of previous maintenance.
Or more precisely the lack there of.
Sounds like they might be able to bench test components, replace head gaskets, re-build & time injector pumps etc. Hell they might even have a torque wrench. I'll go do a looky Lou.

My experience is limited to JT Detroit 71 series, smaller aux. sailboat diesels, & some basic maintenance on Cats & Cummings on the work boats of the oil patch.
I have no tools, place to work & most of all lack motivation. Read old!

Thanks again for such a stellar recommendation. I have gotten so hesitant to even suggest a place to eat, sleep or drink, work on your bicycle, or buy eyeglasses as the consistency is nil.

Correction. The Toyota engine designation should have read 1GD-FTV. Senility settling in.
Confusing my brothers car w/Prado.

Go with the Toyota product if you can. The parts are easy to obtain and a big percentage of vehicle here are Toyota. When you go to the shop I mentioned, please speak with "Hang" and (mention grandfather.) He can give you the lowdown on available parts for different vehicles. They also have good sources for used parts, plus their massive on site parts inventory.

A partial list of Diesels I've works on: EMD (specializing in v-12cyl/v-16cyl/v-20cyl, 645 and 710 models), Cummins, Enterprise, Fairbanks-Morse (opposed piston), Wartsila, Stork-Werkspoor, Waukesha, Cat, Volvo, MAK, and a bunch of others I tend to forget the name of in my old age.

That is one hell of a resume. I'm somewhat competent with ''nuts & bolts''. Electronic diagnosis? Umm..not so much. Opposed piston motors intrigue me. Thanks again for the tip.

The Fairbanks-Morse I worked on was a straight 10 cylinder engine. It had 20 pistons and no valves. (OPs or Opposed-Piston-Engine.) There was an upper and lower crankshaft and the pistons met in the middle were fuel was injected so no cylinder head, no camshaft, no valves/valve-train. The upper crank mainly drove a 2500lb supercharger. To make it even more odd was that it was called 'direct reversible," in that the engine through a reduction gear fed power directly to the propeller. (no transmission or pitch changing prop.) When you wanted to go in reverse, you stopped the engine and started it in reverse. These engines were used in the WWII US "fleet" class submarine in that they were tall, but very narrow. I got a lot of overtime ($$$$) keeping these old hunks-of-junk running. Due to the big supercharger, they sounded like the vacuum-from-hell. (lost a lot of my hearing working on them.)

The first picture of the blue ship is the Alaska ferry E.L Bartlett (retired) that had the opposed piston engines. The whole bow would raise for loading and I sometimes had to run that and repair it when some uneducated deck officer ran it (good overtime money though.) The other other pictures are of my last ship/ferryboat MV Rododendron, my favorite "little" engines (Wartsila, sweet engines) , and me at the engine controls. It was built in 1947 and was a great old boat, the smallest I worked, but the powers that be wanted a new ferry, so sold it (a few months after I retired) and its now at an oyster farm in British Columbia. (a real shame as it could have run for another 20 years.)

I was digging around in my files and found a couple more pictures of the sweet little Wartsila engines and a picture from the run we were on.