Technical issues on Caribbean Princess

[merrilldean]

Panama Canal cruise leaving on Nov 10 and we have been notified of one port change and shortened times at a couple of others. So it doesn't look like any repairs before Late Nov.

 

 

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We were extremely disappointed with the 3 ports , Netherlands, Spain, and Azores, eliminated. Could have maybe lived with one or less time, but this is for our 50th anniversary and only $100 on board credit was unacceptable.

[jovisoul]

Told by Princess in one of the numerous phone calls regarding our transatlantic trip that eliminated 3 ports, they said the problem would be fixed when it returned to Florida at end of our trip Oct. 7. thats why I was surprised to see in June that they had already changed itenerary for someones Oct. 21 sailing. We cancelled the Sept. 22 trip, rebooked Panama on the 27th on Coral Princess

 

Unless they can get it fixed the few hours they are in port that day, I doubt it will be fixed. We are sailing out Oct 7th for the 14-day Circle Caribbean Cruise. We have port changes and less time in Aruba because of the problem. No big deal to us.

[Thrak]

I'm hoping for another post by chengkp75.

 

Chief, I'm wondering why an issue that was reported in this thread on June 9, 2017 is now affecting my cruise for March 18, 2018. There is a dry dock scheduled before that cruise in order to do upgrades for the Medallion system. (This will be the first Medallion cruise and there is still a lot to do to prepare.) With such a long standing issue and with a major dry dock scheduled do you have any further insight into why this issue won't be corrected before then? It would seem that even a non-standard part could easily have been fabricated in this much time.

 

 

I (as well as others) value your well reasoned and knowledgeable opinions and am hoping to hear more from you on this subject.

[likeadisguise]

The problem began right after the ship's most recent dry dock in March (which is when they installed all the Medallion doodads). She doesn't have another dry dock scheduled at this time, though would be expected to have one in 2019, as they go in every two years.

[chengkp75]

I'm hoping for another post by chengkp75.

 

Chief, I'm wondering why an issue that was reported in this thread on June 9, 2017 is now affecting my cruise for March 18, 2018. There is a dry dock scheduled before that cruise in order to do upgrades for the Medallion system. (This will be the first Medallion cruise and there is still a lot to do to prepare.) With such a long standing issue and with a major dry dock scheduled do you have any further insight into why this issue won't be corrected before then? It would seem that even a non-standard part could easily have been fabricated in this much time.

 

 

I (as well as others) value your well reasoned and knowledgeable opinions and am hoping to hear more from you on this subject.

 

Well, from what I can see, the last drydock was March of this year. Drydocks are required "twice in 5 years", so effectively every 2.5 years. However, ships under 15 years old (CB is 13) can substitute an underwater dive survey of the hull in place of the mid-period drydocking, reducing the schedule to every 5 years. This year's drydock was at the 13 year mark, so unless Princess doesn't do underwater surveys (I know HAL doesn't, but most lines do, they're far cheaper), the drydock was for upgrades to the hotel primarily, but that doesn't mean they didn't address the underwater technical maintenance as well. Class requires that if the ship is out of the water, you have to look at everything you can.

 

Now, a one year lead time on a part is not common in the maritime industry, but certainly not unheard of. I'm starting to get the suspicion that one of the propulsion motor windings is damaged. Each of the two motors (one for each propeller) has two sets of windings fed from different circuit breakers on the main switchboard, to provide redundancy. It's like you took two motors and stuffed one inside the other on the same propeller shaft. Each winding in the motor provides half the horsepower of the motor, so losing one winding would reduce that propeller to half power. If this is the case, a one year lead time for what is essentially a new propulsion motor would not be unusual. This repair would also require a drydocking to cut a very large hole in the side of the ship, to get the old motor out and the new motor in. I think it was Carnival Liberty that replaced bow thruster motors in Galveston last year, doing this same method of cutting an access in the hull, but a propulsion motor is about 10 times as large.

 

I may be way off base, due to lack of specific information, but given what I've read, for a non-azipod ship to have reduced power for this long leads me to the one major component in the propulsion system, the motor.

[chengkp75]

I looked back over the thread, and see that I did posit the possibility of an engine problem as well. Not sure, not knowing CB's actual performance, whether taking one large diesel out of service for quite some time would require the amount of speed reduction CB is seeing now. SeaDog-46 posted that CB had a previous problem with an engine, and had a long lead time part delivered for repairs to be completed a couple of years back. He speculated this was a crankshaft, and if that was the case, getting one in less than 9 months would most likely be purely luck that there was one available in the manufacturing queue, as these are not generally fabricated unless a new engine is being built. I remember Oasis had an engine problem, that was still under warrantee, and it was decided that it was simpler and less costly to remove the entire engine and renew it. This required them to cut out a section of the bottom of the hull under the engine, lower the part of the hull with the engine on it to the drydock floor, skid it out from under the ship, and reverse the process with the new engine.

[ED49404]

Just received from Princess of a literary change for our Caribbean Princes cruise Feb 26, 2018. So it looks like the problem will not be fixed by then. I was wondering how this will affect the excursions in Panama? We were hoping to go to Panama City.

[jefa]

Just found out today that the Southern Caribbean part of our 20 day cruise starting on 11th April 2018 has been completely changed and we are no longer going to Grenada, Dominica, Bonaire and Curacao, with St Kitts, Antigua, St Lucia and St Maartin being the substitutes. So the problem won't be fixed before then.

[figmentdj]

Jan 3 panama canal has been altered. Like others the itinerary has Cristobal and has changed Ocho Rios to Caymen Island. No email. Went to Personalizer. We have a TA so they'll probably contact her first. We'll I guess I'll cancel my independent excursions I had planned and book some new ones.

[figmentdj]

By the way, they kept Princess Cays, of course.

[spyro1952]

As of right now this ship is scheduled to stay in the Caribbean year round. This was the original intent when the ship came on line. These itineraries can tolerate reduced speeds etc. I don't expect them to do much of anything until a new ship comes on line and a prolonged dry dock can be scheduled without a disruption in revenue.

[Loonbeam]

From what I understand, and I think this was alluded to, there are also different levels of 'drydock' which a lot of people use to cover any time the ship is out of service for maintenance and upgrades.

 

I probably have the specifics wrong here but there are basically 3 levels:

 

Level 1 - cosmetics/technical/refurb. - In this case the ship may be docked, but not in a 'dry' dock unless hull maintenance is being performed - this would be things like medallion upgrades, carpeting redos, venue restylings, etc. Underwater inspections may be performed.

 

Level 2 - Hull maintenance - the ship is drydocked but in an assembly that allows for inspection, hull painting minor repairs, etc, but not significant structural work.

 

Level 3 - Refit - the ship is in a drydock similar to one used for initial buildout. These docks are equipped with gear to access and remove propulsion systems, deck sections, etc.

 

Assuming I have that right, the majority of routine drydocks are Level 1 or 2, with level 3 only in a response to issues. The scheduled drydock for the CB may be a level 2 which is not capable of doing the work needed to replace a unit assuming the relevant parts are even available. A level 3 may need to be scheduled and there are less of these facilities available as well, so between waiting for parts and a berth it can be a while before everything is aligned.

 

Given that this is clearly a persistent and structural problem, Princess should be more up front about it tho.

[cruzsnooze]

I got a notice that our FEB 6 2017 itinerary is changed and we have shortened port time and one port eliminated. $50 OBC is an insult. Why not fix the problem!

[chengkp75]

From what I understand, and I think this was alluded to, there are also different levels of 'drydock' which a lot of people use to cover any time the ship is out of service for maintenance and upgrades.

 

I probably have the specifics wrong here but there are basically 3 levels:

 

Level 1 - cosmetics/technical/refurb. - In this case the ship may be docked, but not in a 'dry' dock unless hull maintenance is being performed - this would be things like medallion upgrades, carpeting redos, venue restylings, etc. Underwater inspections may be performed.

 

Level 2 - Hull maintenance - the ship is drydocked but in an assembly that allows for inspection, hull painting minor repairs, etc, but not significant structural work.

 

Level 3 - Refit - the ship is in a drydock similar to one used for initial buildout. These docks are equipped with gear to access and remove propulsion systems, deck sections, etc.

 

Assuming I have that right, the majority of routine drydocks are Level 1 or 2, with level 3 only in a response to issues. The scheduled drydock for the CB may be a level 2 which is not capable of doing the work needed to replace a unit assuming the relevant parts are even available. A level 3 may need to be scheduled and there are less of these facilities available as well, so between waiting for parts and a berth it can be a while before everything is aligned.

 

Given that this is clearly a persistent and structural problem, Princess should be more up front about it tho.

 

Not quite. While I agree that lots of CC members use the term "drydock" when they should rightly say "shipyard", since most CC members are only interested in hotel refurbishments, your "levels" of drydocks isn't correct.

 

"Level 1": any and all hotel refurbishments, whether minor freshening of carpets and upholstery to new dining venues, and everything short of actually building a new block of cabins and slapping them on, can be done with the ship sitting at a "wet berth" (tied up to a pier just like a port of call). This typically is only done when corporate has a brain storm and decides that a fleetwide "update" is required, and they want to get it done outside of the statutory drydocking dates.

 

"Level 2/Level 3": There are two types of drydocks, floating (U-shaped, they sink it, bring the ship over it and then pump out the ballast tanks in the dock to float it and raise the ship out of the water), and "graving" (the concrete or stone hole in the ground where they bring the ship in, close a door at one end, and pump the water out and the ship settles onto the dock floor (on blocks)). There is no difference, really, between these two types of docks as far as capability to perform ship repair. Graving docks are generally preferred for newbuildng, because the placing of the large assembly blocks would require a very precise ballasting operation to keep the floating dock on an even keel when the weight is added. Also, graving docks are larger, and can build and repair larger ships. What is different between shipyards is their facilities around the drydock, and their experience, as to whether they prefer to do newbuilding or ship repair.

 

Any drydock is capable of doing propulsion repairs, significant steel renewal (damages, or access areas that I mentioned previously), and even those blocks of new cabins. Heck, Grand Bahamas even got their floating dock to pick up a ship that was too long and too heavy to get fully out of the water (Allure) and perform azipod repairs in specially designed cofferdams.

 

While drydock time is a very valuable commodity, and fairly scarce (more so for larger ships), an unscheduled docking can usually be accommodated within 3-6 months, depending on the flexibility of the shipyard and its customers. The fact that this is looking like it will take longer than that points me to a long lead time part needing to be manufactured.

 

And the next required drydock for CB (since she was just in in March) is not until 2019 when she turns 15 and starts her 4th Special Survey Interval. So, if they are going to fix this before that time, then it will be an unscheduled docking, but any yard capable of getting the ship out of the water is capable of doing a repair (even a motor replacement) on the propulsion.

 

Not sure what you mean by "persistant" problem. Are you referring to the fact that this failure cannot be repaired quickly? I don't think of that as "persistant". Or are you referring to past problems with propulsion that the CB has had? Can you state that this problem is in any way related to any past problem other than the fact that it involves the ship's propulsion?

 

"Structural" problem? How is this structural? And I am even surmising that it would require an access cut in the hull, perhaps not, or even one above the waterline where it could be done in wet berth, as the Carnival Liberty did for its bow thruster motors.

 

As to the questions "why not fix the problem", short answer is "because they can't fix it now".

 

And just to point out, if marketing had not required some high speed transits when they came out with the itineraries, but published the itineraries that they are now changing to, had the problem come up in June, or at any time later, they would have sailed for months with one propulsion system at reduced power, and no one would have known anything. This happens all the time, as I've posted various times before, each of CB's diesel engines gets torn down completely (think of a full engine rebuild for your car) every 12,000 running hours (about 2 years), and these overhauls take 2-4 weeks. So, for weeks at a time, the vast majority of ships are sailing around without the diesel generator capacity to produce full speed of the ship, and no one knows about it, because marketing is told of the overhauls and adjusts the itineraries accordingly.

[foodsvcmgr]

Have just received same adjustments for February 26th sailing, Grand Cayman instead of Jamaica, Cristobal, shortened call in Cartagena, and the $50 p.p.

Although I would prefer the ship to be able to remain longer in Colombia I am not really unhappy with missing Jamaica and will accept the OBC with pleasure.

My real interests on this sailing are the new locks and Costa Rica anyway.

[azbirdmom]

Just found out today that the Southern Caribbean part of our 20 day cruise starting on 11th April 2018 has been completely changed and we are no longer going to Grenada, Dominica, Bonaire and Curacao, with St Kitts, Antigua, St Lucia and St Maartin being the substitutes. So the problem won't be fixed before then.

 

Wow, that's an entirely different cruise, not just a port of two. Guessing they can't make it to the southern Caribbean with the current issues.

[Thrak]

The problem began right after the ship's most recent dry dock in March (which is when they installed all the Medallion doodads). She doesn't have another dry dock scheduled at this time, though would be expected to have one in 2019, as they go in every two years.

 

They haven't installed upgraded televisions or a bunch of the other Medallion stuff yet. They installed wiring and sensors but that's not all that is needed. As far as I know they have yet to change out the TV sets and install the zillion touch screens throughout the ship.

[Thrak]

Chief:

Many thanks for your additional comments and for sharing your actual knowledge with us as opposed to our amateur speculations. Much appreciated.

[chengkp75]

Chief:

Many thanks for your additional comments and for sharing your actual knowledge with us as opposed to our amateur speculations. Much appreciated.

 

I won't say its "actual knowledge", more SWAG (Scientific Wild Ass Guess) as opposed to other's WAG's. ;p

[Loonbeam]

I was close, was not aware that all yards can handle propulsion issues, but the idea behind levels 2/3 was one of enhanced capability (or as you put it facilities around the dockyard).. Overall I was looking to respond to someone who said the ship was going into 'drydock' to get the medallion system installed in 2018 and was trying to convey that it may not have been a true drydock at a facility capable of fixing the propulsion issue (part manufacturing lead time aside).

 

 

As far as persistent I mean that the problem continues to occur (the ship is limited in speed full time, its not an intermittent problem where the ship is operating at full capacity but suffers either outages or malfunctions due to the problems).

 

Structural in this context was intended to mean cutting into the hole and performing the necessary 'surgery' on the propulsion system. Taking into account the potential for lead time, the extended nature of this leads me to the assumption that its not a below the waterline fix, although I want to make clear that no one here, myself included, can say that without knowing what the problem definitively is.

 

And yes, marketing/planning fouled up on this one, but I think all the cruise lines put themselves at risk for this kind of thing by pushing schedules so far out to try to capture sales. Even the airlines have realized there needs to be a limit on that to limit messes you cannot forsee.

 

 

 

 

Not quite. While I agree that lots of CC members use the term "drydock" when they should rightly say "shipyard", since most CC members are only interested in hotel refurbishments, your "levels" of drydocks isn't correct.

 

"Level 1": any and all hotel refurbishments, whether minor freshening of carpets and upholstery to new dining venues, and everything short of actually building a new block of cabins and slapping them on, can be done with the ship sitting at a "wet berth" (tied up to a pier just like a port of call). This typically is only done when corporate has a brain storm and decides that a fleetwide "update" is required, and they want to get it done outside of the statutory drydocking dates.

 

"Level 2/Level 3": There are two types of drydocks, floating (U-shaped, they sink it, bring the ship over it and then pump out the ballast tanks in the dock to float it and raise the ship out of the water), and "graving" (the concrete or stone hole in the ground where they bring the ship in, close a door at one end, and pump the water out and the ship settles onto the dock floor (on blocks)). There is no difference, really, between these two types of docks as far as capability to perform ship repair. Graving docks are generally preferred for newbuildng, because the placing of the large assembly blocks would require a very precise ballasting operation to keep the floating dock on an even keel when the weight is added. Also, graving docks are larger, and can build and repair larger ships. What is different between shipyards is their facilities around the drydock, and their experience, as to whether they prefer to do newbuilding or ship repair.

 

Any drydock is capable of doing propulsion repairs, significant steel renewal (damages, or access areas that I mentioned previously), and even those blocks of new cabins. Heck, Grand Bahamas even got their floating dock to pick up a ship that was too long and too heavy to get fully out of the water (Allure) and perform azipod repairs in specially designed cofferdams.

 

While drydock time is a very valuable commodity, and fairly scarce (more so for larger ships), an unscheduled docking can usually be accommodated within 3-6 months, depending on the flexibility of the shipyard and its customers. The fact that this is looking like it will take longer than that points me to a long lead time part needing to be manufactured.

 

And the next required drydock for CB (since she was just in in March) is not until 2019 when she turns 15 and starts her 4th Special Survey Interval. So, if they are going to fix this before that time, then it will be an unscheduled docking, but any yard capable of getting the ship out of the water is capable of doing a repair (even a motor replacement) on the propulsion.

 

Not sure what you mean by "persistant" problem. Are you referring to the fact that this failure cannot be repaired quickly? I don't think of that as "persistant". Or are you referring to past problems with propulsion that the CB has had? Can you state that this problem is in any way related to any past problem other than the fact that it involves the ship's propulsion?

 

"Structural" problem? How is this structural? And I am even surmising that it would require an access cut in the hull, perhaps not, or even one above the waterline where it could be done in wet berth, as the Carnival Liberty did for its bow thruster motors.

 

As to the questions "why not fix the problem", short answer is "because they can't fix it now".

 

And just to point out, if marketing had not required some high speed transits when they came out with the itineraries, but published the itineraries that they are now changing to, had the problem come up in June, or at any time later, they would have sailed for months with one propulsion system at reduced power, and no one would have known anything. This happens all the time, as I've posted various times before, each of CB's diesel engines gets torn down completely (think of a full engine rebuild for your car) every 12,000 running hours (about 2 years), and these overhauls take 2-4 weeks. So, for weeks at a time, the vast majority of ships are sailing around without the diesel generator capacity to produce full speed of the ship, and no one knows about it, because marketing is told of the overhauls and adjusts the itineraries accordingly.

[chengkp75]

The "Wheel Gang" (the outside machinist gang assigned to pulling ship's "wheels" (propellers), used to be the "kings of the shipyard" and the thing that shipyards extolled when extending quotes to shipowners. Nowadays, with the aging of shipyard workers (in the US for example, the average age of shipyard workers is 62) and the loss of many skills, the wheel gang is more commonly the "Keystone Cops". With the advent of today's paints, requiring more surface prep, more closely monitored surface and weather conditions, the correct mixing, and application of the paint, the painting gang is now the "king of the yard", as this is what controls the time in the dock.

[postman999]

From Princess on earlier post:

"Hello, Sherry. We understand your concern and can assure you that our operation of Caribbean Princess in no way compromises the safety of our guests or crew. The motor issue happened after the ship left its recent dry dock, and the repair requires the ship to be taken out of service. We are working to determine the next possible time for Caribbean Princess to be taken out of service to complete the repair."

 

This is from Princess's Facebook page

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

[postman999]

A further update (repost)

 

As noted in multiple posts throughout various cruise forums and such, there's an issue with one engine/propeller that is reducing it's top speed. So, they have to slow the other engine to account for it, not cause vibration oe sail in circles. They can max out at around 17-18 rather than 20-22... And that can affect travel times between ports..

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

[momphoto]

We got an email this morning on a schedule change due to technical issues for our mid may 2018 cruise. Seems crazy that almost 9 months out they still will have issues??

[LaxDaddy]

I did a Transpacific cruise last summer from SF to Sydney on the Sun Princess. I looked at the ship's record every day of that trip for location, speed of the ship, etc. on our tv. I don't remember a day when we went over 17 knots. Most of the time we were at 16-17 knots on the crossing. These ships are designed to go 20-22 but I don't think they do it often.