Product Description

Plaintiffs alleged in publicly filed U.S. asbestos personal-injury and wrongful-death litigation that the Enterprise Engine Company DMRV-16 — a V16 four-stroke diesel produced at Enterprise’s San Francisco works (a lineage that later merged into the De Laval Turbine / DeLaval / Transamerica DeLaval enterprise-engine business) — was manufactured and repeatedly overhauled using asbestos-containing gaskets, packing, and sealing elements at every hot-side and pressurized joint.

The DMRV-16 and its close cousins served the U.S. Navy as ship-service generator prime movers and auxiliary propulsion engines aboard cruisers, tenders, oilers, and other auxiliary hulls from World War II through the Cold War. Litigation records describe alleged chrysotile-bearing gasket material at the cylinder head-to-block joint, at the exhaust manifold and turbocharger flanges, at the air-inlet manifold, at handhole and inspection covers on the crankcase, and at lube-oil and jacket-water piping unions running to the ship’s fresh-water and lube-oil systems.

Because the DMRV-16 was a large-bore, high-torque platform running continuously to feed the ship’s electrical bus, its gaskets allegedly hardened and baked onto the mating surfaces between overhauls. Enginemen performing scheduled major overhauls at sea and pierside — and shipyard mechanics performing depot-level rebuilds — allegedly scraped and wire-wheeled the residue off in machinery spaces without effective respiratory protection or fiber-controlled work practices.

Workers Exposed

  • Enginemen (EN) and motor machinist’s mates (MoMM) standing engine-room and auxiliary-machinery-room watches on cruisers, tenders, oilers, and other auxiliary ships equipped with Enterprise DMRV-series ship-service generators or auxiliary engines
  • Machinist mates (MM) who cross-decked into engine-room work on DMRV-equipped hulls
  • Shipyard diesel mechanics at Mare Island, Hunters Point, Long Beach, Puget Sound, Philadelphia, and other Navy yards performing depot-level DMRV overhauls
  • Insulators stripping and reapplying asbestos lagging on DMRV exhaust piping during overhauls