The Saga Continues:

Pete Wass

Pete Wass

Well-known member
I finally was able to get an electrician to hook up the new motor for my South Bend yesterday. He arrived at about 2:45 PM and left about 6:15. (This guy is an old acquaintance and has done a lot of Industrial work.)

He couldn't seem to get his mind around the whole thing and finally called the guy I bought the motor from. He than began to wire with purpose. By 6:00 he was ready to be gone but the motor would only buzz . He re-checked his connections and found one that was backwards. He corrected his mistake.

He flipped the switch and on she came. He then flipped the switch to reverse after the motor stopped and she reversed. He deemed the project a success and after looking at another electrical project I am contenplating, left.

After he left I engaged the belt and flipped the switch. Buzzed but did not turn the spindle. I slacked the belt tension, allowed the motor to start and then applied tension. The spindle turned. I then did the same on the other two remaining belt positions and there was a noticable difference in the speed of all three positions.

After letting the lathe run a minute or less I began to smell what appeared to be burning plastic! EEEK ! I shut her off, un-plugged her and left. Drove home; about 40 minutes away and let the Electrician have a drink or two and his Supper then called him to give him the good news. Got his recorder and have not heard from him yet. (8:35AM)

It appeared to me that the motor may be running slow. I don't know how fast 1725 RPM's is visually but I could count the revolutions of the keyway easily.

I continue to live an interesting life :). I did find and clean up the collet holder and draw bar for it though while he was working. Wasn't a complete bust.
 
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A few questions.
What's the voltage that motor is set for?
Single or 3 phase?
How long since it last ran?
Is it the original motor and when was it last serviced, opened up?
 
A note of reasurance..

It only takes a few seconds to fry a motor.. The burning smell is not a good one.

Been there and got this Tee shirt.

Good Luck
Nat Lambeth
 
Me too, some so called journey electricians have not a clue about some things. My 30yr electrician didn't understand the phase converter or how to hook it up. Burnt up a Bridgeport motor. Yes he paid for it.
Butch
 
So this "electrician.." let's say he were a gunsmith.........

You finally get together with him and are standing around the lathe, he's scratching his head but after calling the guy you bought the lathe from he bails in. Gets the barrel chucked up and spinning, the reamer is secured in the sliding thingie with the wheel so's he starts 'er into the hole. Pushing on the sliding thingie until the reamer touches something...


whirra-whirrawhirrawhirra......

Time to start chambering :cool:

Roundie roundie wit' da wheel...... sckreeeEEEEEEHH!!!!!!!!


oops.

Must need some oil or sumpin'


ruump-ruummpp-rumpsckritchscritchscritch-ereeEEEEEEE!!!! There it goes AGAIN!

hmmmmm

Well


hmm

let's try turning 'er the other way!

ree-reehh-reehh whirrawhirrawhirrahhh

HEY LOOK!!! CHIPS!!!


well there ya' go,


see ya.....


:)
 
Pete, just a WAG, you said you "engaged the belt"---how free does the spindle turn with the belt engaged AND disengaged?
 
lejarretnoir said:
A few questions.
What's the voltage that motor is set for?
Single or 3 phase?
How long since it last ran?
Is it the original motor and when was it last serviced, opened up?
Click to expand...

The motor is a rebuild from a local rebuild shop. It is wired for 110 ( remember, I had a qualified Industral Electrician hook it up) I saw it run in the rebuild shop. It is obviously not the origional motor.
 
The Spindle

JerrySharrett said:
Pete, just a WAG, you said you "engaged the belt"---how free does the spindle turn with the belt engaged AND disengaged?
Click to expand...

and the shaft the motor runs are free running. After thinking this over a little, this is the second motor that only seemed to run at half speed. I am going to check the voltage to the recepticles in that room tomorrow. Perhaps there is lo voltage in that room. The 1/2 hp motor I took off and thought was defective may not beeeeeeee
 
Another thing to think about Pete, is that large 110Vac single phase motors need a start cazapitor to get going. I haven't seen your mentioning of the wiring of the Start Capacitor. Is there one, and is it wired correctly?

Paul
 
There is a difference between a motor expert and an electrician. Take it to an electric motor shop and have them fix what is wrong.

The best electrician cannot make a troubled electric motor run just by hooking wires up to it.

Think of it this way. An electrician can wire a light socket so that a good light bulb will burn but he cannot fix an burned out bulb.

Concho Bill
 
Pete Wass said:
and the shaft the motor runs are free running. After thinking this over a little, this is the second motor that only seemed to run at half speed. I am going to check the voltage to the recepticles in that room tomorrow. Perhaps there is lo voltage in that room. The 1/2 hp motor I took off and thought was defective may not beeeeeeee
Click to expand...

If it is really running free it should be the 60 hz that sets the speed not the voltage.

Mike
 
Al,
I believe that the speed of the motor is a funcition of the number of poles that the rotor has, and the frequency of the current. 30 Hz.? Where do they have that? This country has standardized at 60 and I believe Europe is 50. It seems to me that that the point about the difference between an electrician and a motor specialist is at the core of this situation. Just because they both deal with electricity does not mean that they are interchangeable. It may be that picking up another motor is the easiest way out. A schematic would also be helpful for getting things hooked up right.
 
alinwa said:
Maybe his wiring is only set for 30 hz??
Click to expand...
I have a friend who collects clocks, knows all the movent types, chiming options - all of that.

Eventually he bought a Synchronome master clock & a couple of slaves (an old office set up) that ran off mains voltage. When he tried to set it accurately to the Australian talking clock - OK, it was a time ago - he found no matter how well he set it in the morning, it was out again when he got home & setting it at night made it out the next morning. Finally he talked to the power company & found that during the day when under load, the network loses a hertz here & there and they run the generators up a tad at night to catch up.

Moral is check your electric clock over 24 hours, not that this has the least to do with Pete's motor.
 
Almost as good

Bill Wynne said:
There is a difference between a motor expert and an electrician. Take it to an electric motor shop and have them fix what is wrong.

The best electrician cannot make a troubled electric motor run just by hooking wires up to it.

Think of it this way. An electrician can wire a light socket so that a good light bulb will burn but he cannot fix an burned out bulb.

Concho Bill
Click to expand...



The Electrician taked to the guy in the Motor Shop as he was hooking it up or during the time he was at least.
 
The Electrician

pbike said:
Another thing to think about Pete, is that large 110Vac single phase motors need a start cazapitor to get going. I haven't seen your mentioning of the wiring of the Start Capacitor. Is there one, and is it wired correctly?

Paul
Click to expand...

Mentioned there was a capacitor on the Motor.

I downloaded an exchange on this very subject from the Practical Machinist South Bend Forum and will leave it with the Lathe so that when he returns to fix the situation he can read it. It is one of those discussions that seems logical when one reads it but I couldn't begin to tell you the content of the exchange; has something to do with hooking up 5 wires to 6 and taking the power wire up to the rotaty switch.

One would think this machine is not the only type or kind that uses a rotary reversing switch, would one?
 
Peter,

You should have told me you needed a motor when you were in FL. We use the 3/4, 1.0 and 1.5 HP motors on our boatlifts. I have several in the shop pre wired and plug in ready complete with a reversing on-off switch.

Octopus
 
Pete Wass said:
One would think this machine is not the only type or kind that uses a rotary reversing switch, would one?
Click to expand...

One would think this is simple but sometimes not. There are motors with different wiring setups just as there are different reversing switches and all are not compatible with each other. The last motor I needed to replace was a Dayton and I needed it fast so I went to Grainger and said I need a replacement. The old motor was obsolete so they sold me a replacement. I went to wire the replacement and it seemed to me that there was no way the new motor would work with the existing Dayton reversing switch. A quick call to Dayton tech support confirmed what I was finding and the easiest solution at the time was to use a different reversing switch that was compatible with the new motor.
 
Good News:

the Electrician called yesterday and said he had found the problem and fixed it. he said the Motor rebuilder had wired the motor wrong internally so that only set of windings was working. He re-wird it and has it working ( HE SEZ).

I am going there in directly and find out. I'll let ya know.

If I had known Jon, I surely would have taken you up on the offer ( If wishes and nuts were candy and nuts, eh? )

On another note, I saw a two step motor pulley for sale on Ebay for a SB Heavy 10. I also remembered that the shaft that is driven by the motor has two steps to it also. Is there another speed option available by changing the drive belt from one pulley to the other? Suppose there might be, eh? Would it reduce the speed of the lathe or increase it? would it perhaps change it from inch to metric?
 
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