odd motor odor

Well, I started up the new fan motor on the apple cooler and got an odd odor from it. As I'm storing big $ (for me) of fresh fruit, I shut it down after an hour. let the room clear and ran all night on just the second cooler. tried again this morning and odor returned. So we've limped all day on one cooler. One cooler will hold temp as long as we don't remove, wash, and bring warm fruit back in. Something I've GOT to do shortly.

I'd think after two hours it would clear, but no joy. Anybody heard of this?

Karl

I had a crosscut saw that has a motor specific to the saw. It would burn-up every few years and I would have it rebuilt. One time it burned up it smelled strange...indescribable, different than usual motor farts. I asked the winder and he said he used a new supplier and the winding insulation was supposed to be better. It did last longer than the time before that.

Its not running hot as its one inch from a five horse R502 evaporator coil and the fan it runs pulls the air around the motor. I've not a clue, but I'm worried about the fruit picking up something from the odor. if it was just an ordinary fan, I wouldn't care.

Karl

Is that a brushed motor?

Is it hot to touch?

I would try pulling the motor and it's fan and running them on the bench in the shop where you can better monitor the temp and current and see if the motor varnish just needs some time to bake while not risking making lovely phenolic scented fruit.

FWIW, the Emerson I mentioned can be had for around a hundred bucks and is intended as a replacement for the blower motors in home heating systems, so it shouldn't produce any smell.

Finding a ~1150 RPM fan motor isn't a difficult task, they're relatively abundant. I was recently looking for a 1/2 HP 650 RPM motor for a whole-house ventilation fan (blade dia ~34"), and I was finding many more of the 1000-1200 RPM motors.

Surplus suppliers generally have a wide range of new motors, and there are a lot of surplus dealers.

But these guys that come to the group posting their almost-daily problems always have a better idea, so it turns out that their problems are more difficult for them to resolve.

If someone at a motor shop told him that a ~1150 RPM motor was uncommon, he must have given them a reason to want him out of their shop.

It's a fan motor, ferfuxsake.

Can you post the odor so we all can partake?

Paul

Can you be any more specific about this "odd" odor? There could be billions of things. Does it smell like burning insulation? Volatile solvents? Paint? Mothballs? Skunk?

We need a little more to go by here.

Thansk, Rich

I'm sorry you find me so annoying. i have had quite a number of issues before the group lately. it tends to run in spurts. maybe i should post more political crap so i fit in.

FWIW, the combination of extra large frame, 1/2" shaft, and 1150 RPM was the problem. remove frame size and they are easy to find - that's what i did. But it looks like i also need the totally enclosed, I'm going to end up buying another motor. Didn't know about that gotcha.

karl

Sorry, don't know how to describe. My guess is whatever they used to dip the rotor for insulating in is outgasing. if the room weren't sealed, i doubt it would be noticed.

karl

Karl, I'd much rather hear about your fan motor woes than the latest extreme rant about people who must be idiots because they're not on the same extreme as the ranter.

Maybe you should post a picture of your motor adapter to the drop box, for some real metalworking content.

And good luck -- I can certainly understand not wanting to taint your fruit with a funny motor-derived taste or scent. Product boo-boos that take your customers time to find out and that make them look bad to _their_ customers are the ones that they tend to remember for years, even if you only do it once.

Feeling slightly pissy today?

Uncomfortable that people ask metal related questions here?

My poodle outgasses when he's been eating cat shit, but that's an oder that's (quite unfortunately) easy to identify.

I hope you get your problem solved.

Glad to know I've got one freind left.

Not on your life. This little job was a cluster F%#&.

I grabbed a piece of mystery metal and couldn't get it to weld right. The result looked like a very sick chicken had just dropped by.

Then I couldn't get the slots milled, went through three endmills. At least now the welding problem made sense. Tool steel don't weld well and don't machine at all after your try to weld.

Then I found a measuring error and had to widen the slots.

Then I found the special 220 plug and wire was too short cause the motor connections were on the other side, so I spliced in an extra piece of wire.

Then I found the new base hit the special plug in for the above and I had to hacksaw an indent. I would have milled it but the base already looked like a failed abortion.

Karl

Aw c'mon. All the ineffective perfectionists in the world need to see something that looks as ugly as can be yet still gets the job done.

It sounds like some of the jobs that I've done. It appears that my brain is split about evenly between a British engineer and a Soviet one:

B.E.: "It's not perfect. Don't ship"

S.E.: "Perfection is the enemy of good enough. Besides, we're behind schedule as it is. Hand me that address label"

B.E.: "No! Death before dishonor! This is an ugly piece of @#$% and it shouldn't be allowed to live!"

S.E.: "If it works, it's beautiful. Look! I have the customer's address scrawled on this shopping bag with the dog barf on one corner. I'll just tape it on, and away we go"

UPS Man: "Okey dokey"

B.E.: "Aaaagggggggghhhhhhh!!!!!!"

With all the equipment that you write about month after month/year etc, you should have no less than a dozen spare motors in good operating condition, for spares.

Voltage, shaft size.. so what? You can't find more than one voltage in any of your structures? Would you need advice on wire gage and type of insulation before you could put a different motor on the machine?

Disassemble a motor to turn down the shaft, or turn a bushing to fit. Complicated issues, all of 'em.

There isn't another fan on your property?

Get some catalogs, buy some spare parts, then a simple motor change won't be a major problem just when you're about to face a (nother).. CRISIS.

So why all the needless drama?

You know when the equipment is going to be needed, you've been doing this for years. You sound like the ones that have freezing problems, like they aren't aware what month it is.

When some kind soul gives you a solution to one of your many problems, you can't ship them a little box of apples, because you just don't do that. Big joke, right?

That's just what I was thinking.

The expert on metal related questions chimes in.

Feed your family out of a bought-used refrigerator. You would just hate to have to throw away a used appliance? Have them eat from used plates and utensils, too? Mount speakers on a mill. Undecided about what color to paint a vise or anything else? What's a heater?

Sounds like it doesn't even rate "not bad for a farmer"