Black box inside Motor Head

[Mcgolf12]

Hello all,
I'm on winter break now from college, and am back home.
In August we began the project of converting all front end combination motors to Relay Start.
We've had good success with this, and I finished the last 6 machines yesterday.

Mind you we have mostly Westinghouse Motors and Gearboxes.

One of the last motors to be converted was a little different.
This motor was painted a bright blue, other than normal and had a sticker on it.
IMG_0380[1].jpg

Anyways. I did the conversion of chopping out the auxillary board and moving the red wire from the motor plug to terminal 6.
No harm done. Just like all the others before.

My question is, what is this little box? I've asked Rep and he thought it could be a voltage regulator or something for the old switches....
I've never seen anything inside the motor like this, nor has he.

On the top side of the picture below, it is ziptied to the vent area. It has three smaller gauged wires (red yellow and black) coming from it and are attached to the
terminal board.
IMG_0381[1].jpg

The next picture shows them connected to the terminals.
IMG_0384[1].jpg

Should I cut this little box out? I dont want current jumping somewhere it shouldnt or burning up a perfectly good motor.....

Thanks ahead of time!

[Rep]

It's very interesting for sure, I know I've never seen anything like them. I thought maybe it was like those little boards that went on the chassis contactors to try and lessen the juice some and make it last longer which is what I meant by voltage regulator. Or maybe some kinda internal SS switch that works with the original switch or bypasses it? I know I'm curious, always eager to learn!

[Tablejam]

Was the mechanical start switch in this motor along with this box?

If there was no mechanical start switch and just this box, if its anything like the Franklin motors I would guess its a solid state start switch but I've never seen this one before.

I like the suggestion given by Rep, makes sense and mayhapse that company custom modified that motor to have it?

[Stoctster]

I've seen Solid State start switches similar in design but generally they're much bigger in size....this one is confusing because it only has 3 wires; in my experience, most start switches have 4 wires (2 across the the start windings in place of the centrifugal, 2 for the 115V switch supply). Can you tell us which circuit the wires connect to? Am trying to wrap my head around the purpose of this but it's hard without knowing whether it's connected across the start or run windings etc..... Failing that, I'd call the company listed on the sticker and see if they can give you any further information.

[Mcgolf12]

The original contacts were on the boards before i converted it. I cut them out so they cant interfere with anything later.
The conversion calls for the red wire from the motor plug to be moved from terminal 6 to terminal 1. This completes the conversion. When I do the conversion, i cut out the auxilliary board along with the two wires attaching it to the terminal board. And I take out the red wire going to the contact left on the terminal board along with the contacts. No contacts are left in the head.

Stoctster: Im still learning the terminology, I dont know which wires belong to which circuit, so bare with me here. Here are the colors of the wires and where they go.

AFTER THE CONVERSION
From Plug:
White: To Terminal #2
Red: To Terminal #6 (was on #1 before)
Brown: To motor windings
Yellow: To Terminal #3
Black: To Terminal #4

From the little box: (Smaller gauged wires)
Black: To Terminal #2
Yellow: To terminal #6
Red: To a wire nut, to the windings.

From the Kixon:
One wire to Terminal #3
One wire to windings.

From the windings:
Red: To little box
Green: To Terminal #2
Yellow: To terminal #3
Brown: To Motor Plug
Black: To Terminal #2


I believe this is all correct. I went over this twice.

[slb785]

red and black wires are start winding wires, blue (or green) and yellow are run windings. Just imagine your windings as a REALLY long wire, one end is red one is black for start, and one is yellow and one is blue for run. Its pretty simple really. Removing this little box shouldnt be an issue at all. All your switches do is allow the current to flow to the start windings until the motor is up to speed (less than .5 sec), then once its running the switch breaks the start winding circuit to allow the motor to continue running on the run windings. Id remove the box. If i remember correctly, you are wiring your red wire directly to the red wire from the plug, so when removing the box, take the red winding wire and connect it to terminal 1. I can get wiring diagrams of the motors, but not until wednesday when i go back to work

[BG]

To clarify, this box keeps the contact points on the start switch terminal board from burning up, similar to the S&T boards that used to be mounted on top of the old AB contactors. Not sure if they're even made anymore or what company made them.

[Mcgolf12]

Slb: thank you for explaining it!! I noticed an error in my post, but yes, just connecting the reds from the plug and the windings.

BG: I believe you just confirmed our thoughts! The box must be some sort of regulator to save the contact points so they last longer.

[Tablejam]

It's very interesting for sure, I know I've never seen anything like them. I thought maybe it was like those little boards that went on the chassis contactors to try and lessen the juice some and make it last longer which is what I meant by voltage regulator. Or maybe some kinda internal SS switch that works with the original switch or bypasses it? I know I'm curious, always eager to learn!

Yup, there it is.

[Rep]

Wow, what a guess. Even a blind monkey gets a banana once in a while I suppose lol. I had mentioned the old SS's that looked like bigger versions of these but I know the ones were had were all WAY bigger and mounted outside the motor. That's why I thought maybe it was something to keep the switch from getting so much juice and frying (as they all do in time)

[Tablejam]

Score another one for Rep!

[Mcgolf12]

Thanks guys! Glad to know! I will take it out tomorrow!

Never a day where you don't learn something new..

[Rep]

Absolutely my friend, I kinda steered ya in the right direction but you never stop learning. I don't even really work with 70's anymore and I learned something new (or at least confirmed a belief!)

[AMFDOCTOR]

Just going over how the little black box is wired up into the motor. All of my potential relays, that I have running are mounted on the stator itself. Easier to change and if someone changes the stator, I now have everything that might have gone wrong on the bench, not in the wireway or whatever. Anyway .... the way this thing is wired up, is just like I have my relays wired up. It cann't be any form of a contact saver because, under normal conditions the switch contacts are closed. If you look at a saver that's installed in a chassis on a table or sweep relay, the contacts are open. The triac that is used can not work with a closed to open configeration only open to close. Maybe it's a SS form of a potienta relay.

[wb8yjf]

It's very interesting for sure, I know I've never seen anything like them. I thought maybe it was like those little boards that went on the chassis contactors to try and lessen the juice some and make it last longer which is what I meant by voltage regulator. Or maybe some kinda internal SS switch that works with the original switch or bypasses it? I know I'm curious, always eager to learn!

I saw a ton of these back in the mid to late 80's - all shapes and sizes - some mounted internally and some externally. They were solid state start switch 'experiments' - at least that what I called them since I had to go to quite a few AMF test houses to install, replace, or monitor the progress of them (frame count) that were working.

I had forgotten about these things until I stumbled onto this thread!