[esailor Team]

18 Dec 2024 – Oral Exam for CE 9000kW Examiner: Asif Hanif
The exam started with the usual ID checks and showing him around the room etc. He was
very nice, the questions flowed pretty well and he gave me time answer. He prompted me
a fair few times when I’d forgot to mention things. He was rather expressionless after I’d
finished answering the questions, which made me doubt myself.
The questions
• How would you take over a new vessel as CE? What certificates would you expect to
see? What would you want to discuss on the handover with the CE? All standard stuff.
This lead onto:
• Voyage planning; what would items need to be checked before sailing? The main thing
he wanted to hear was that I would make sure that the fire detection and safety systems
were operational, critical spares list had been checked etc. I got to talking about fuel tank
levels and this lead to:
• How would calculate my fuel requirements for the next voyage?
• What kind of fuel would you order? I told him DMA for my vessels engines
• What would you be looking for in the fuel spec? Standard answers from ISO 8127
• Who would you contact? Bunker agent, told him again that I would cross check the spec
with my engines requirements
• What documentation is the CE responsible for maintaining? I started reeling some off
and we talked about the importance of the SMS. I got to MARPOL and then he asked
me:
• What are all the annexes?
• What documentation has to be upheld with regard to the OWS? Oil Record book
• What are all the items that have to be recorded in the ORB?
• What is the purpose of SEEMP? I told broke the 3 parts of it and he seemed happy with
that
• Draw me the timing diagram for a 4 stroke engine? I screwed this up a bit and he said
explain it to me instead. Thankfully I found it easier to explain than draw and he was fine
with that
• When your company ask you to send a ME performance report, what will you include? I
went through how we do it onboard which is all via plugging a laptop into the ECU and
running a test at different engine loads, which gives you all your cylinder pressures,
exhaust temps and SFOC etc. We compare that to our last report and also to sea trial
data. He was very happy with that
• How is thrust transmitted to the ships hull. Standard stuff
• What are the losses in the system? Propeller slip, heat and vibration losses in the ME
bearings, torque losses in the gearbox & thrust bearings etc. I waffled my way out of that
one
• What are the different ways start an engine?
• What are the shutdowns on ME’s?
• Draw a jacket water cooling system for a ME?
• How would your assess the condition of the cooling water? Told him about Nitrite testing,
chlorides & TDS etc
• What are the different ways to keep a boat stable for the comfort of the passengers? I
just said stabilisers & anti heeling tanks, he was OK with that
• How to stabilisers work? I had to bullshit my way outta this one by talking about
gyroscopes, roll velocity and acceleration signal being amplified etc. He seemed to go
for that
• What types of controllers do you find onboard? I did some more waffling here about PID
controllers and gave him an example of how a steering system works. I think he got tired
of me waffling and moved on
• If you are planning to work on the switchboard, how would you plan the job. This was all
standard risk assessment, LOTO and proving circuits dead etc
• How does an alternator produce electricity? How does an AVR work? What would you
do if you can’t get a generator to start because of no excitation? I have to thank Matt
Gosling from Whitehorse here, because he gave me some excellent answers for these
types of questions.
• How would you go about tracing earth faults?
• Explain the ISM code and why is it important?
• What would inspect on the bottom of the hull in dry dock? All standard stuff, he only
asked for more details on checks on the rudder. I said remove drain plug, check for
water & pressure test. I also mentioned carrier bearing and Jumping clearance checks
• What steps would you take to prevent a fire onboard? Good house keeping &
maintenance etc.
• Explain how you plan a fire drill? I told him that I would do a surprise drill, pretend HiFog
wasn’t working & 3rd engine not accounted for, last seen working in the ER. That gave a
lot of scope to talk about all the different aspects & good points to cover during a debrief
It felt like a grilling at the time, but looking back it wasn’t too bad, I was just really
nervous at the beginning but settled into to it, finished strong and most importantly,
PASSED!!!

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