Help and advice please...

[Edmundo]

Well Mike, let me tell you that the emergence of the Murex name has born seriously delicious fruit!

I rang them this morning and the lady I spoke to said she'd worked for Murex for over thirty years and knew their Tradesmig machines were indeed built in Hungary, with chaps from the UK regularly going over there to the factory. Whilst Murex weren't able to help with Eland spares themselves she did put me on to one (of many) Murex service agents - the one she said always had "old stuff knocking around".

Pete at "Techworld" in Gravesend: 01474 326403.

A very knowledgeable chap who knows the Murex and Eland brands well; he said the designs were originally Esab (Murex parent company), manufactured in Hungary whereupon they 'borrowed' the design, painted it blue, and slapped the Eland name on the side! Until they were given a slap and told to stop it.

Pete gave me the part number or the transformer I need, a price, and the details of the supplier!

Technical Arc: 01904 410041
http://www.technicalarc.co.uk/

They build and repair all manner of welding equipment and sound like a very useful crowd to know!

The bloke I spoke to is called Les and seems very knowledgeable.

My transformer part number is AUX1506, which will be wound to order, be on my doorstep in a couple of days, and has cost me the princely sum of £62 inc. VAT and delivery!

Incidentally, both Pete and Les commented that I should check my fan as it may well be the cause of the transformer failure. Technical Arc can supply a replacement, if needed, which is 230v rather than the 220v I have now. I shall be trying my fan out shortly!

As ever, thankyou for all your help everyone. If the information I've provided above is of any use to anyone else, I hope it has gone some way to returning the assitance I've had on here.

Looking forward to my delivery - I shall share my excitement with you all in due course!

A somewhat happier Edmundo.

 

[Edmundo]

Good evening all.

My shiny new transformer showed up today and, with a considerable amount of fettling, I've fitted it:

I had to lengthen all the wires a little as the connector strip is in a different place to the original. The new transformer is somewhat chunkier, hence the effort to get it in!

However............

After I double checked everything, I switched the unit on and it immediately flashed from the ON/OFF switch, with a 'pop' and immediately blew the fuse in the PCB again. The whole welder remains dead, as before.

I did check the fan the other day, as recommended by Murex, simply by wiring it directly to a length of flex and a plug. It's a 220v fan but a short burst of 240v is fine for a brief test. The fan was a potential cause for the transformer failure but it checked out fine.

Since this evening's pop and flash, I've checked all the new transformer winding for continuity and resistance and it looks as if it's all fine. Even so, I'm getting higher voltages on everything - higher than they should be:

240v - 243v (close enough)
220v - 243 - odd?
27v - 33v
8v - 15v

Is my meter reading too high for some reason? Am I not testing it right? Why is the 220v showing the same as the 240v windings?

And what the hell is shorting out and killing my beloved welder???

Any help would be hugely appreciated please!

Ed

 

[mike 109444]

I would start by disconnecting ALL of the new transformer OUTPUT. Then plug machine in and see if it pops a fuse. If it does then there is a fault before the transformer OR with the transformer (or the way you have connected the inputs). If the machine does NOT pop fuse then connect up ONE pair of out puts at a time, trying it between each additional reconnecting. You should then at least find the pair that is causing the fuse to pop !
The voltages do look a bit off BUT the first one in your list 240 = 243 That should be what ever you incoming supply is as that is where that comes from!

 

[Edmundo]

Mike, as ever, thanks for your advice. I've spent the last week speaking to all manner of experts with various bits of helpful tests to conduct. However.....

It is now official - I am a complete and utter pen1s!

After printing out an old photo I posted on here, and scrutinising it through a magnifying glass, the consensus of opinion between two friends and me was that I had wired my new transformer incorrectly!



It seems that when I was carefully labelling each wire before removing it individually from the old transformer, I’d labelled two the wrong way round. The 240v and 220v terminals on the transformer share the same “0” – I had simply got the 220v and 0 wires round the wrong way, creating an immediate short when turning the machine on!



I had sworn blind to everyone I sought help from that I had done everything very carefully and that there must be some other fault. Whilst I have no real excuse for my utter buffoonery, all I can attempt to claim is that I must have been distracted when ‘carefully’ labelling the wires – I’d simply labelled two wires incorrectly.

Please feel free to point fingers and laugh openly at me. I also deserve any rotten tomatoes lobbed in my direction!

Ed

 

[mike 109444]

So does this mean you have correctly wired it NOW and it's working or have you stuffed the new tranny ?

 

[angellonewolf]

as us all learn from your mistakes thats all we can do we all make mistakes only stupid peolpe do the same thing twice

and i have never done it twice never honest

 

[Edmundo]

Hahaha, to err is human after all!

What annoys me the most is that I was SO careful to avoid exactly the the mistake I made, hence dealing with each wire individually. Without a wiring diagram it would have been so easy to end up with a bundle of random wires without any clue where any of them went.

I harassed Pete at Techworld almost on a daily basis, tracing wires while he was on the 'phone to me. He kept saying, "I just don't understand how it ever worked before if it's wired like that..." He was 100% right! I'll ring him tomorrow and explain my idiotic mistake and thank him profusely for putting up with me.

Mike, all is now working perfectly! The new transformer is still in one piece. I took the opportunity, whilst the transformer, contactor and mounting bracket were removed to clean the bits I couldn't get to before, and I've fitted a new neon switch, as the old neon didn't light up. I've also repaired one of the trigger contacts in the Euro connector as it appears the "repair" by a previous owner wasn't ideal - a tiny piece of rolled up kitchen foil is not really the way to go me thinks! I made a new pin and tapped it into a 1.5mm hole I drilled.

Overall, all I can assume is that my only fault was that the primary 240v on the transformer failed, shorting the 220v circuit in the process. The neon switch and fuse on the PCB are clearly in the 220v circuit rather than the 240v. I think the shared "0" didn't help as that was a direct short when wired incorrectly.

I might be able to get hold of a PCB wiring diagram - if so, I'll happily share it with you all. A wiring diagram of the whole machine still seems impossible to track down unfortunately.

Edmundo Stupido

 

[mike 109444]

Well it's good to see that it's not fried!
Good on you for posting back even though you have had to have a big slice of humble pie.

 

[Edmundo]

At least I can now weld the pie dish back together!

 

[slim_boy_fat]

At least I can now weld the pie dish back together!

Only if you TIG it like the Project Binky boys' mug......

 

[Edmundo]

Look what dropped into my email inbox this morning:

Not that easy to decipher but I've cleaned them up as much as I can in Photoshop.

I’m certain the top image is relevant to the Eland 130 (what I have) as the trigger switch and motor terminals are both on spade terminals (marked as [M] with terminals A and B – and “T” with terminals C and D). From the other wiring diagrams for the Eland 175, I think both these circuits run through the big multiplug.

The bottom image doesn’t look quite right for the Eland 130 as it shows many more multiplug connections than mine has; my multiplug only has A1-4 and B1-4. At least it has component details on it, which I imagine must be at least similar!

Anyway, I hope the diagrams prove useful to someone at some point.

 

[GraemeVW]

Just replying to bring this thread back to where I can find it.