Spider Relay Issue

[Tablejam]

New one for me.

82/70 SS chassis, National motor with AMF -044 start switch.

Runs fine except when it does an auto offspot it trips the curtain wall breaker. C1 looks good, tried different relay, sweep run and reverse switches, different chassis, and the os lever gives the sweep plenty of time to reverse up, pause, then run to zero. Sometimes the breaker trips as soon as the relay engages and sometimes it trips when the os lever goes back on the switch. This was installed nine months ago and worked perfectly until tonight. No obvious wire issues with the relay or switches. I did notice that when it trips the breaker the spider relay arcs brightly, normally there is no arcing at all. Manually running the sweep in both directions works fine and the motor gearbox has not had any issues. The arcing is telling me something but im not sure what that would be. Wondering if it could be the start switch or sweep capacitors. Anybody run across this before and what was it? For now I have the relay turned off so the machine runs but I would like to fix this and get it working properly again.

[slb785]

Auto offspot? Spider relay? Am I missing something here?

[Ed Fox]

TJ, give me a call and I can connect you with the engineer that designed the product for us.

Thanks
Charlie

[Tablejam]

I used instructions provided on here to make my own, which was working very well. Im going to try a few more things before I call anybody.

[Andrew]

The circuit breaker tripping obviously suggests a short. I can only guess a wiring/connection problem somewhere in the high-volt wiring (i.e. between the relay and the sweep reverse switch). You've eliminated the relay contacts (which would have been my first guess). If you disconnect the sweep motor and trigger the OS switch repeatedly, can you get the breaker to trip?

[Tablejam]

I tried a different motor with a mechanical switch and swapped the capacitors, just to eliminate them but no change. Looked again and did not see any obvious wire problems in the control box, capacitors and C1 plug, I even tested all the wires from the relay to see if any were grounding and no. I will try what you suggest when it slows down some. If it helps at all when I run test the auto offspot it works just fine with no arcing the first one or two times, then the next time I make it auto offspot the relay arcs and trips the breaker. The diodes on the relay test ok current only goes in one direction and the capacitor seems fine. Im stumped.

[Tablejam]

The circuit breaker tripping obviously suggests a short. I can only guess a wiring/connection problem somewhere in the high-volt wiring (i.e. between the relay and the sweep reverse switch). You've eliminated the relay contacts (which would have been my first guess). If you disconnect the sweep motor and trigger the OS switch repeatedly, can you get the breaker to trip?

Tried this with the sweep at first guard and the motor unplugged, ran it through several OS cycles and no arcing or breaker trip. Plugged the motor back in and repeated, after a couple of times the arcing was back and the breaker tripped. Wondering about the bleed resistor. I guess I will have to look inside the motor plug and front end for anything obvious but its strange that it is behaving this way.

[Tablejam]

Ok so I took some time today and investigated. I replaced several front end wires that were brittle but I don't believe that was the cause as it still happened. After a few hours of work with the wiring, I ended up putting in new sweep switches and what do you know....no more arcing or tripping....after about 15 os cycles. So the 'good used' switches I tried must have been dodgy as well as the ones I pulled out, eventhough they seem to test fine on the bench...trash now! This machine was playing games with me!...lol

[Tablejam]

Well no luck, the same problem has returned. Im out of ideas. If nobody has a suggestion then im just going to remove it. Manuals running the sweep forward and backwards works just fine so im lost.

[Stoctster]

Hi Tablejam...I'm kinda annoyed with my lack of memory because I recall having a similar issue with the first spider relay I hooked up in the last center I worked in (years ago). Only difference was it was blowing the fuse in the stepdown transformer we use here in Aus to convert from 240V, could be related to the problems you're having. I just can't remember what I did to fix it *slaps head*. Assuming you're using the same setup I did (from the diagrams here on Bowltech) there's not much I can suggest you haven't already tried - you mentioned you changed the chassis, did you also change the board? (I'm assuming you're running OmegaTeks?). I'm just clutching at straws here, but if I recall the ground for this circuit comes from a diode on the OmegaTek board - I can't imagine this would be the cause but it's probably worth a try. The only other thing I could suggest is the capacitor running from the spider relay base to ground - it seems very unlikely (I agree with what Andrew said previously about it being in the HV circuit) but i can't think of anything else just now. Good luck!
Regards,
Scott.

Edit *just saw you had already checked out the capacitor from the spider relay, I must have missed that, sorry*

[pinfeed]

I'm with slb, as I don't know what a spider reley or auto off spot is, but once we had a machine that kept tripping the wall breaker. The wierd part of it was that it tripped when the spot solenoid fired. But the fix was the black sweep switch on the back control panel...Still scratching my head on that one. Just thowing darts for ya TJ.

[Tablejam]

During auto offspot when the sweep reverses up the breaker will usually trip when it stops the first time just a tad past zero (before it returns to zero).

I'm thinking it's HV somewhere too as it's always the main breaker that trips, but I cannopt figure out where. manually running the sweep all over the place both directions works absolutely fine.

Well, I have until Sunday to figure this out, if I don't by then it comes out and this little project will just have to go on the 'FAIL SHELF'.

[AMFDOCTOR]

Just thinking, Have you tried replacing the relay itself or the socket? The relay maybe a old spot relay and when it pulls in the arcing is causing a bridging of the contacts, motor is trying to go in both directions and takes out the breaker. I would think that by holding the relay in manually, you do not get the arcing. Just a thought.

[Tablejam]

The relay and socket are brand new.

[AMFDOCTOR]

Another thought, could there be a issue with the way the machine is wired up for the sweep reverse circuit? What I'm trying to say is you know when you wire in a potential relay or a AMF SS to a sweep motor you have to move some wires around to get it to work properly. Could this be the source of the problem? If the machine has a potential relay or a AMF SS on the sweep, try putting everything back to normal and see what happens with the spider. If you have potentials I can show you how to run them without changing any wires in the wireway.