Load Trail Gooseneck Dump Time.

[NIsaacs]

My son's next project, 1 of 6. Not sure if that is one tower or two, I gotta find out.

View attachment 115201

He has these things planted. Each hole is 6' x 28', the bore machine cost $17k for six holes. It comes from Italy and is mounted on a large track excavator. They can go 120' deep.

 

[NIsaacs]

Working on the tub grinder again, conveyor this time. Re-did one new splice and small repair on a second one. New pillow block bearings on the top idler, SKF 206 oem were on it, not sure what the new ones will be. Dang, they are rusted on. I have to remove the bearing housing so I can pull on the inner race, they still pull hard.

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Back in business, it's ugly, but it is a grinding fool. Note my little helper Bearings are IPTCI industrial units.

 

[DavidC]

I do not envy you on the splice. I have seen the mechanics do it and what a tedious project. I would go stir crazy by half way.

 

[NIsaacs]

but what do I know I was the electrician

David, or anyone that understands residential power.

I am having an issue with my swamp cooler water pump. I have went through 3 in 2 days. First one didn't work at all, never moved, second one lasted 3 hrs, third one about 5 hours. The first two I figured junk pumps, now I am not so sure. The first pump replacement (about 4 years ago) I cut the plug off the pump wire and wired it direct to the switch, like oem was. This time I wired a pigtail on the switch wire so I can just plug in the new pump. The 2 black wires are wired to the black and red wires of the pigtail, green wires are hooked together, just simple 120 volt stuff. Is some thing not right here? Last night I went to town and bought a volt meter, thinking I have high or low volts at the cooler. I checked power everywhere, it is all 124 volt. I even checked volts to the pump while the blower motor was running, no drop at all.

The pumps are the standard Ace Hardware issue, Power Cool brand. I checked with Lowes and Homedepot and they sell the same thing so I can't try a different one. What am I overlooking here?

I just checked for resistance at the pump plug, there is none, so the circuit is open for some reason. I pulled the fan cover off and there is definite evidence of moisture in the motor. I assume that is normal, given the wet environment that it operates in.

 

[DavidC]

Possibly a bad batch of pumps ?. Little motors usually have an internal thermal that cuts out when overloaded/heated and maybe bad or the windings blew out. I would get an ammeter and a pump from a different vendor. A clamp on ammeter will allow checking the amps with the conductor seperated. By appearance the water is hitting that pump pretty hard as we all know water and electricity do not mix. I had a few coolers in the day and never ran into this problem.Were those voltage readings taken to neutral or ground or both ?. One of the overhead branches leaking on the pump ?. Bottom of the cooler relatively clean not jamming the impeller ?. That's all I can think of right now but do get or have a clamp on ammeter.

 

[TFucili]

Can you turn the impeller by hand? If you can't nail it down, maybe take the next pump, and let it recycle water in a 5gal bucket as a test. If it passes, and quickly fails in the cooler there is something flaky beyond Chinese pump quality.

 

[NIsaacs]

Thanks David and Tom. I need to pickup a ton of wood pellets from TSC so I will get a pump from them. I can't believe I got 3 bad pumps, (all ACE Hardware) but maybe... I just plugged my 3.5 amp 1/2" drill in my pigtail with quite a bit of hand resistance on the chuck and all seems well. The water pump is only 0.9 amp so I think my power is okay.

The pump shaft is free. I will check and make sure no water is flowing where it shouldn't when I plug the next one in. I do have a 2" gas powered water pump, NIB for a fire pump rig I was going to make.

 

[TFucili]

The pump instructions call out a "shipping lock" in the base. Is it something that could fall into the volute and get jammed up or cause drag?

 

[DavidC]

Thanks David and Tom. I need to pickup a ton of wood pellets from TSC so I will get a pump from them. I can't believe I got 3 bad pumps, (all ACE Hardware) but maybe... I just plugged my 3.5 amp 1/2" drill in my pigtail with quite a bit of hand resistance on the chuck and all seems well. The water pump is only 0.9 amp so I think my power is okay.

The pump shaft is free. I will check and make sure no water is flowing where it shouldn't when I plug the next one in. I do have a 2" gas powered water pump, NIB for a fire pump rig I was going to make.

All it takes is a little scrimping on the winding varnish from human or machine application or solder joint connection, defective batch of thermals etc. and the whole run is screwed up unless someone catches it. Hopefully TSC has a different batch. If your really curious you can take the pump apart, find the thermal and ohm across it and the load side of the thermal to the other connection lead to see if the windings are open. Also check the wire connections. I have seen you dig into the cause of failure so I know you can do it with that inquisitive mind

 

[NIsaacs]

Good eye Tom, however, I think they are talking about this external lock. The white flat piece in the picture, it locks one of the baseplate clips.

 

[NIsaacs]

David, you are talking Greek (thermal) I went to a one room school house in the woods of Montana

 

[DavidC]

David, you are talking Greek (thermal) I went to a one room school house in the wood of Montana

You will know it when you see it, usually just a small rectangle soldered into the winding wires or the lead wire from the plug to the winding wire. If the windings get to hot it opens shutting down the motor and is suppose to reset when cooled down.

 

[DavidC]

Most people that went to those one room schools are smarter than the 100 grand plus graduates.

 

[NIsaacs]

You will know it when you see it, usually just a small rectangle soldered into the winding wires or the lead wire from the plug to the winding wire. If the windings get to hot it opens shutting down the motor and is suppose to reset when cooled down.

Okay, now I savvy when you say thermal switch, like an overheat switch. I installed another new one, same brand and size. No water leaking onto the pump motor. I did build an umbrella/cover over the motor out of a plastic coffee container, so any mist coming off the pad will not get in the motor. Now I just wait a few hours

 

[DavidC]

Apparently still working ?

 

[TFucili]

Apparently still working ?

He's in Snowflake, gotta wait for it to thaw out

 

[NIsaacs]

He's in Snowflake, gotta wait for it to thaw out

More truth than you think only 44* this morning! It was working fine last night. I did turn the pump on for second this morning, just to check, it works...

 

[DavidC]

More truth than you think only 44* this morning! It was working fine last night. I did turn the pump on for second this morning, just to check, it works...

BRRRRRRRRRRRR. 56 in Minot, major thunderstorm went through last night. There are definately more bad days here than good. It's either raining or windy enough to blow us to Kansas. And it's suppose to be something like 95 in Phoenix,sheeesh.

 

[TFucili]

More truth than you think only 44* this morning! It was working fine last night. I did turn the pump on for second this morning, just to check, it works...

I figured it would be chilly, as it was about 55 here when I went to coffee this morning.

Have they been replacing the pumps under warranty?

 

[DavidC]

Tom, looks like your gonna get wet next week from that hurricane coming up baja. They are talking possible flooding.