Help with phase converter. Old Bradbury screw lift & very old converter.

[Jelly_Sheffield]

VFD's are a piece of ****, not sure what would require a professional, specialist or tech support.

It depends which one you choose, the cheapest models available from eBay/Amazon/AliExpress often come needing at least some of the parameters setting, and with awful documentation.

In the case of the car lift:

- buying a 1~240V to 3~440v VFD from a reputable manufacturer/modifier and wiring it in would work out the box (at home, exposed VFD as the controls absolutely not PUWER compliant),

- using a 1~240 to 3~240 and swapping the motor to delta is marginally more complex,

- wiring the existing controls back to the VFD and setting the parameters, might flummox some people at first but with a bit of reading it's all learnable, although if you can just ring up the seller and ask for the correct details it's a lot easier.



When I was suggesting tech support, I was responding to a poster with quite a few different machines who was finding understanding the issues with 3-Phase hard going.

Not knowing what they had exactly, advising them to buy VFD's from someone who could help them select appropriately seemed sensible.



There's definitely pitfalls with VFD's on more complex machine tools, depending on what you're retrofitting your ability with wiring/re-designing control panels, and when taking about multi-motor machines, understanding of the limitations of VFD's with respect to on-load switching come into play.

Nothing too difficult, but the first time you do one, it would be easy to lose a lot of functionality (or even blow up a VFD) if you misunderstood...

I'm that situation, for a beginner it's well worth buying a slightly more expensive VFD from a company with a good tech-sales guy to guide you, totally worth it IMO.



All bar one of my 3ph machines would need an extensive re-wire, and 3 would need more than 1 VFD to still work properly after conversion, so I didn't bother going that route...

Had I bought a less complex lathe when starting out, I may not have committed to the RPC and Genny.

 

[Relic]

Nice.
Motor underneath and extended drive shaft an excellent idea.
Regarding my single phase motor exercise.
Owner did not want to alter his lift.
Easier to flick it off and buy what he wanted.
Yup.
Who cares how long it takes.
VSDS on single phase put out about 275v ac.
That's why they fry your motor if it can budge the load when star (read name plate carefully ) on 230v ac.

 

[minimutly]

It depends which one you choose, the cheapest models available from eBay/Amazon/AliExpress often come needing at least some of the parameters setting, and with awful documentation.

In the case of the car lift:

- buying a 1~240V to 3~440v VFD from a reputable manufacturer/modifier and wiring it in would work out the box (at home, exposed VFD as the controls absolutely not PUWER compliant),

- using a 1~240 to 3~240 and swapping the motor to delta is marginally more complex,

- wiring the existing controls back to the VFD and setting the parameters, might flummox some people at first but with a bit of reading it's all learnable, although if you can just ring up the seller and ask for the correct details it's a lot easier.



When I was suggesting tech support, I was responding to a poster with quite a few different machines who was finding understanding the issues with 3-Phase hard going.

Not knowing what they had exactly, advising them to buy VFD's from someone who could help them select appropriately seemed sensible.



There's definitely pitfalls with VFD's on more complex machine tools, depending on what you're retrofitting your ability with wiring/re-designing control panels, and when taking about multi-motor machines, understanding of the limitations of VFD's with respect to on-load switching come into play.

Nothing too difficult, but the first time you do one, it would be easy to lose a lot of functionality (or even blow up a VFD) if you misunderstood...

I'm that situation, for a beginner it's well worth buying a slightly more expensive VFD from a company with a good tech-sales guy to guide you, totally worth it IMO.



All bar one of my 3ph machines would need an extensive re-wire, and 3 would need more than 1 VFD to still work properly after conversion, so I didn't bother going that route...

Had I bought a less complex lathe when starting out, I may not have committed to the RPC and Genny.

Some of the bigger ABB ones we use take some serious studying, with mode switching based on binary inputs effectively making them multi tasking drives, did my head in when I met one of them the first time. Many more options and features than most will ever use.
Right now I'm reverse engineering a pair of turbine generators (3 phase motors actually) that will run into vfds that connect to the grid - effectively transferring power the other way, at any frequency you choose (double ended inverters ACS 800s if anyone's interested). The setup parameters list is huge...

 

[Onoff]

As an aside, if you match motor and inverter of the same make then there's likely a lot of the parameters already set in the startup software. You can often pick the motor from a list.

Start mixing and matching, say an SEW drive and a Bonfiglioli motor and you have to set up many more parameters manually.

 

[Onoff]

Getting mine ready for it's MOT yesterday and using the converted Grazia lift. With a MK4 Mondeo estate it takes 1m45s to reach full height. Not money making speed in a garage but this is at home. Perfectly good. A little video:

https://flic.kr/p/2qgc8Gs

New front number plate, had a fault come up due to a broken wire on the ABS so ditched the o/s rear ABS plug & socket for silicone grease packed crimped connections, heat shrunk over.

https://flic.kr/p/2qgmHc5

Wish I hadn't jet washed the underside, I need to do both track rod ends as the rubbers have perished!

Today I'll look at the exhaust blow and the plan is to spray a load of waxoyl / Ensis-V type stuff over the rear subframe.