Oneway 2436 Motor Noise

[Dale Bright]

My 3hp, 2436 has developed a noise and vibration in the motor. It is worse when the speed dial is at the 1,000 rpm position (if the belt is on the middle pulley). The noise is the same with the belt in place or with the belt off of the motor. The noise and vibration starts at about 600 RPM disappears when the speed reaches 1300 RPM. The lathe is number 1924.

I would appreciate any advice, as Oneway is on their mid summer break.

Thanks,

Dale Bright

 

[odie]

Just some guess work here.........

If the noise exists with, or without the belt......I'd say your noise is in the motor, or motor mount.

The hinged motor mount (I'm making the assumption that the OW2436 has a hinged motor mount) will have to have some amount of looseness in the hinge itself, in order for the hinge to rotate as it should. If you install the belt with some tension, you might be able to narrow it down between the mount and the motor itself.....or not! It would be interesting to see if there is a difference in the noise with additional belt tension........

Of course, you've checked to see that the motor mount bolts from the motor to the hinged mount, and from the hinged motor mount to the lathe frame are all tight.......right?

ooc

 

[Dale Bright]

Odie, I have checked all of the mounting hardware and hinge points. The noise and vibration does lessen some when the belt is extra tight but it is not a significant change, really just a difference in the pitch of the sound.

Dale

 

[odie]

Odie, I have checked all of the mounting hardware and hinge points. The noise and vibration does lessen some when the belt is extra tight but it is not a significant change, really just a difference in the pitch of the sound.

Dale

OK......I guess my input hasn't been much help to you.....

How long have you had it, and how much use has your lathe seen? Could the motor bearings be the source?.....still guessing. How about the step pulley attached to the motor main shaft? Is that tight?

Maybe someone else has a suggestion that will help you to pinpoint the problem.

good luck

ooc

 

[Bill Boehme]

My guess is that there is a problem with worn out bearings. With the belt removed, feel for any radial play in the motor spindle. Normally, the play is too small to see, but you can usually feel any free play by trying to wiggle the spindle from side-to-side. If your hearing is keen, you also might even be able to faintly hear any free play. One other thing to do is to "hand prop" the motor pulley to get it turning as fast as you can by hand. A bad bearing is likely to make a very slight rumbling or ticking noise.

One cause of early bearing failure on motors is too much belt tension. This may not have anything to do with your particular situation, but this is something that woodturners should know, but very few do. Ideally, electric motors should only have a torsional load and no overhung radial load. This is not really possible for belt driven loads, but v-belts, especially the poly-V belts need very little tension and are most efficient when they are not tight. Also, the motor pulley should be as close as possible to the motor face.

 

[Owen Lowe]

Odie, I have checked all of the mounting hardware and hinge points. The noise and vibration does lessen some when the belt is extra tight but it is not a significant change, really just a difference in the pitch of the sound.

Dale

Just some thoughts...

Did you:
- check the set-screws on both motor and spindle pulleys?
- make sure the index pins are completely disengaged and secured?
- ensure nothing is in the tube that might be rattling?
- ensure the end plate at the tailstock is secure?

 

[Bill Boehme]

Odie, I have checked all of the mounting hardware and hinge points. The noise and vibration does lessen some when the belt is extra tight but it is not a significant change, really just a difference in the pitch of the sound.

Dale

I just noticed this post -- not a good idea to tighten the belt! This sounds like an indication that the bearings are worn and the source of the noise. If so, I think you may now know the words to the second verse of this tune.

Just some thoughts...

Did you:
- check the set-screws on both motor and spindle pulleys?
- make sure the index pins are completely disengaged and secured?
- ensure nothing is in the tube that might be rattling?
- ensure the end plate at the tailstock is secure?

He said that the problem was there even when running the motor with the belt removed which sort of narrows the problem down to the motor. There does exist the very small possibility of a problem in the controller and associated electronics, but I would check out the usual suspects first.

 

[Dale Bright]

Thanks for all of the advice.

Bill, I also think it is a bad bearing in the motor. I have not removed the motor from the tube, yet. I plan on doing that tonight. I put the belt on extra tight just to test it for change. I normally just let the weight of the motor set the belt tension.

It looks like a trip to a motor repair shop for bearing replacement is the fix but I am waiting for a call back from Kevin at Oneway.

Dale

 

[Bill Luce]

Thanks for all of the advice.

Bill, I also think it is a bad bearing in the motor. I have not removed the motor from the tube, yet. I plan on doing that tonight. I put the belt on extra tight just to test it for change. I normally just let the weight of the motor set the belt tension.

It looks like a trip to a motor repair shop for bearing replacement is the fix but I am waiting for a call back from Kevin at Oneway.

Dale

Dale,

Hopefully the shop can test the motor at the speed at which it behaves the worst to identify the issue.

I sort of hope it is a bearing on the motor as generally those are easy to have replaced. Course there is the hassle of pulling it and a couple trips to the shop, but otherwise it should be straight forward.

I had a bearing fail in a 3hp Leeson motor within a few months some years ago and have had no problems with it since.


Course it would be nice if it turned out to be something even simpler, but it sounds like you have ruled out mounting issues.

Let us know what you figure out. Bill

 

[Owen Lowe]

He said that the problem was there even when running the motor with the belt removed which sort of narrows the problem down to the motor.

Thanks Bill, I see now that I overlooked that when I read it.

 

[Dean Center]

Have you reviewed this thread?
http://www.aawforum.org/vbforum/showthread.php?t=8678

 

[Bill Boehme]

Changing out the bearings is a fairly simple task, but it does require some effort to locate a supplier for the right bearings and the right type of grease (NLGI-2 polyurea such as Chevron SRI-2 or Exxon Mobil Polyrex EM) and the effort of opening up the motor and removing and replacing the bearings. Also, there is a "correct" amount of grease -- too much or little will shorten bearing life considerably. Sometimes it is just easier to take it in to a shop if you have a local motor repair place.

 

[Dale Bright]

Well, it is not the bearings in the motor. I took the motor to a good repair shop and they checked it thoroughly and found it to be in excellent condition. They told me, from my description of the problem, that it must be the controller. The motor mechanic said it seems like the motor my not be geting all legs of power, consistenly, and that will make the motor vibrate.

I do not see any alarms or anything obviously wrong on the controller, so I will have to wait until I can talk to Kevin at Oneway, next week.

Dale

 

[Bill Luce]

Well, it is not the bearings in the motor. I took the motor to a good repair shop and they checked it thoroughly and found it to be in excellent condition. They told me, from my description of the problem, that it must be the controller. The motor mechanic said it seems like the motor my not be geting all legs of power, consistenly, and that will make the motor vibrate.

I do not see any alarms or anything obviously wrong on the controller, so I will have to wait until I can talk to Kevin at Oneway, next week.

Dale

Dale,

I am disappointed it wasn't the motor as that would have been such a welcome easy solution.

Let us know what you figure out.

Don't remember the specifics, but a friend of mine had a problem with his controller in an older 2436, and OW told him that his controller actually contains a second "controller". So in his case, he was able to rewire his existing controller to use the "second" internal controller and was back in business.

I am only going by what my friend said (he has passed now). His lathe was a couple years older than yours and I know the controllers have changed over the years. I am guessing his was a PC-3 controller and yours might be a PC-7 or possibly even newer.

Depending what you hear from Kevin, one thought might be to swap motors with a friends 3hp 2436 to compare. As you can see, they come out pretty easy.

 

[Bill Luce]

Changing out the bearings is a fairly simple task, but it does require some effort to locate a supplier for the right bearings and the right type of grease (NLGI-2 polyurea such as Chevron SRI-2 or Exxon Mobil Polyrex EM) and the effort of opening up the motor and removing and replacing the bearings. Also, there is a "correct" amount of grease -- too much or little will shorten bearing life considerably. Sometimes it is just easier to take it in to a shop if you have a local motor repair place.

OT,but something I have never gotten a good handle on is the zerk fitting on largish (5 - 10 hp) electric motors like my Baldors on my compressor and hydraulic pump for my hydraulic chainsaws.

Over the years I have asked a couple shops about recommended grease intervals and mostly have been told that more harm than good has been done greasing that zerk and that many auto shops etc simply choose not to grease them at all.

So for now I have never added grease to my bigger motors. I may be sorry, but those stories of too much grease, the correct grease, etc have me spooked.

 

[Bill Boehme]

...Don't remember the specifics, but a friend of mine had a problem with his controller in an older 2436, and OW told him that his controller actually contains a second "controller".....

I feel like I am well up to speed on various types of motor controllers and that description doesn't quite make sense to me ... while it is possible that there was two controllers in the box, I suspect that either he misunderstood what OW said or perhaps more likely OW's "explanation" was a bit wonky. The most important thing is that the problem was solved.

If one had access to either a scope or a CAT IV multimeter that could handle the high voltage spikes from the controller, it could be easily verified whether one of the three phases was not getting power.

There are some industrial controllers that drive multiple motors -- either in sync or separately, but the cost is somewhat proportional to the number of motors that they can drive. I would not expect to see something like that on a single motor machine (not that it can't happen).

 

[Dale Bright]

My lathe controller is a GPD 315 V7.

Dale

 

[Bill Luce]

I feel like I am well up to speed on various types of motor controllers and that description doesn't quite make sense to me ... while it is possible that there was two controllers in the box, I suspect that either he misunderstood what OW said or perhaps more likely OW's "explanation" was a bit wonky. The most important thing is that the problem was solved.

If one had access to either a scope or a CAT IV multimeter that could handle the high voltage spikes from the controller, it could be easily verified whether one of the three phases was not getting power.

There are some industrial controllers that drive multiple motors -- either in sync or separately, but the cost is somewhat proportional to the number of motors that they can drive. I would not expect to see something like that on a single motor machine (not that it can't happen).

Quite likely he misunderstood what OW told him. ALthough they told me years ago that they actually stopped using the early controllers as they realized they had much more functionality than the lathes needed and stopped using them because they cost more. I believe one of the controllers they went with at some point for a while failed at a high enough rate they went with a slightly better one.

Would be interesting to know how many controllers they have evolved through and why (although benefit vs costs is always the tradeoff I am sure).

Still I am guessing you are right, the redunacy OW told my friend about was something other than a full second internal controller.

 

[Bill Boehme]

I took a quick look at the manual for the Yaskawa GPD 315 V7 and didn't notice anything about multiple controllers -- but I didn't spend too much time looking. The main reason that I don't like Yaskawa controllers is their manuals -- the most convoluted arcane thing that I have ever seen.

 

[Dale Bright]

Well, I got to speak with Kevin tonight and it looks like my controller is in need of repair or replacement. He is going to have their rep from the controller manufacturer call me tomorrow.

Does anyone know where to get the controller for a decent price or where to one one repaired fairly quickly?

Dale

 

[Bill Boehme]

It depends on whether the controller is industrial or commercial grade. "Quickly" is not a word that repair facilities know unless it is a high dollar controller in a manufacturing facility -- and then the cost will be (well, you can imagine). Commercial grade controllers are generally not supported for very long and are mostly treated as throw-away items.

I used to buy used industrial controllers from the industrial motors section of eBay, but it seem that part of eBay has been "discovered" by too many amateur eBay'ers who have driven up the prices on industrial surplus and also many new eBay dealers have moved in selling a lot of overpriced junk. Your replacement motor controller would not necessarily have to be a drop-in replacement for the old one, but depending on how your drive and control panel is set up, it might involve changing up the wiring a bit if a different model controller is substituted. There would also be some performance differences such s the way that acceleration/deceleration work, as well as braking and minimum speed smoothness. Depending on the HP rating of your motor, you might possibly find a controller for under $200, but more likely in the range of $300 to $400. Often the low cost controllers have fewer bells and whistles and are more time-consuming to set up.

 

[Dale Bright]

I heard from the controller manufacturer, through Kevin Clay at Oneway, and a repair for this problem is about the same as buying a new unit. I have ordered the new controller from Oneway and it will arrive programed and ready to install. They are trying to ship it today. Kevin and the staff at Oneway have been very responsive.

Dale

 

[Bill Luce]

I heard from the controller manufacturer, through Kevin Clay at Oneway, and a repair for this problem is about the same as buying a new unit. I have ordered the new controller from Oneway and it will arrive programed and ready to install. They are trying to ship it today. Kevin and the staff at Oneway have been very responsive.

Dale

Dale,

I think buying the matched controller is the I'd go myself to prevent any setup or compatability issues. Even within the OW lineup, the controller for the 2hp and the 3hp is different. For folks really experienced with all that there seem to be more choices, though.

And I think the OW sales office in generally does a good job and you should get the controller pretty quick. Gloria has always mailed things to me very promptly once she was in the loop.

Care to share the cost of the replacement controller? I am curious in case I need to do the same someday.

And let us know how it is to install and how it works out. Are they sending you the same model exactly?

 

[Dale Bright]

Bill,

The price is about $550. I do not know if that is just the programmed contoller module or the entire gray controller box with switches, I forgot to ask. I will let you know. It will not ship until Tuesday of next week. I ordered a Remote On/Off at the same time and they will hook it up before shipping.

Dale

 

[Gynia]

The remote on/off is a really nice thing to have. If you turn larger pieces (30 pounds or more) the breaking resistor is a good addition.

 

[Bill Luce]

The remote on/off is a really nice thing to have. If you turn larger pieces (30 pounds or more) the breaking resistor is a good addition.

I totally agree, in fact have two remotes on one of my lathes. Handy if you turn both outboard and inboard both.

The braking resistor is important, too, although starting at some point in time was not a simple addition of a resistor that it was early on. If I recall correctly, at some point they sent different physical controller configurations depending on the breaking resistor vs no resistor user choice.

So if yours is early enough for a simple resistor to be added and you haven't done that yet, I agree with the recommendation whole heartedly if you turn big work at all.

 

[Dale Bright]

If UPS is on schedule, I should receive the new controller with the Remote On/Off attached, on Friday. I will let everyone know how the install goes.

I do have the braking resistor in my lathe.


Dale

 

[Bill Boehme]

Rather than using some form of braking, most good AC controllers can be programmed to have a deceleration profile that will slow the motor over a period of several seconds. The advantage is no extra parts are needed. The disadvantage is that it can't make sudden stops (that might actually be an advantage if you do not want chucks to unscrew themselves in a sudden stop).

DC injection braking also does not require any additional parts assuming that DC power is available at the VFD. The advantage is fast braking. The disadvantage is that all of the energy is dissipated in the rotor of the motor.

An improvement over DC injection braking for small motors is dynamic braking where the kinetic energy of the spinning mass is dumped into a resistor or bank of resistors -- heating them rather than the motor. This works fairly well, but the braking efficiency decreases as the motor slows down. Fast braking is normally considered an emergency situation -- or at least something that is not used frequently. Stopping the motor very frequently using dynamic braking may overheat the load resistors. It also produces more heating in the motor than steady state operation.

Regenerative braking is the most efficient, but most small motor variable speed drives do not use this method of braking because of the additional circuit complexity (cost). Hybrid electric and all electric automobiles use regenerative braking so that kinetic energy can be recovered and stored in batteries. Large industrial motors also use regenerative braking where the recovered energy is returned to the power grid.

There is also another form of braking known as reverse plugging. As far as heating the motor is concerned, it is much worse than DC injection braking, but it does stop the motor very quickly.

 

[Bill Luce]

If UPS is on schedule, I should receive the new controller with the Remote On/Off attached, on Friday. I will let everyone know how the install goes.

I do have the braking resistor in my lathe.


Dale

Details and pics of the process (and old and new controller) very welcome.

 

[Patrick Miller]

I, too, will be curious if this solves the issue. I am fighting with my OW1640 which I bought used (several years old with very few hours use) in February and has had an annoying squeal from about 4-500rpm and up (no vibration that I can tell). Seems more electrical in nature than mechanical although it comes from the center of the motor. I pulled the fan side end bell off the motor and popped the grease seal off the bearing- appears to be in show room condition as does the whole lathe. I have emailed at length with Kevin at OW and Frank McCabe at ONdrive (OW drive supplier) checking the drive parameters especially carrier frequency but the noise is still there. I even posted a YouTube video so they could hear the noise. I have heard of motor/vfd compatibility issues so just purchased a NOS motor of a different brand (Reliance vs OEM Marathon) off Ebay at a low price and will wire that up and see if this changes things. Shotgun diagnostics but although helpful neither of the gentlemen I have talked with have been able to offer a definitive answer. I will post my results also.
thanks
--pat

 

[Bill Luce]

I, too, will be curious if this solves the issue. I am fighting with my OW1640 which I bought used (several years old with very few hours use) in February and has had an annoying squeal from about 4-500rpm and up (no vibration that I can tell). Seems more electrical in nature than mechanical although it comes from the center of the motor. I pulled the fan side end bell off the motor and popped the grease seal off the bearing- appears to be in show room condition as does the whole lathe. I have emailed at length with Kevin at OW and Frank McCabe at ONdrive (OW drive supplier) checking the drive parameters especially carrier frequency but the noise is still there. I even posted a YouTube video so they could hear the noise. I have heard of motor/vfd compatibility issues so just purchased a NOS motor of a different brand (Reliance vs OEM Marathon) off Ebay at a low price and will wire that up and see if this changes things. Shotgun diagnostics but although helpful neither of the gentlemen I have talked with have been able to offer a definitive answer. I will post my results also.
thanks
--pat

Yes post findings as they will be helpful for any of us later trying to trouble shoot.

A friend bought a new 2436 some years ago (3hp) that the motor made a weird sort of sqwealing sound similar to your description. He even tried a new motor, but that motor sound exactly the same. He sold it unused to a guy that was in a hurry for a 2436 and didn't care about the noise.

My 2436 was a 2 hp, so we couldn't try his motor with my controller as I was told they were not compatable.

Patrick, I looked a bit for your vid to see if the sound is similar to how I remember that sound I am referring to, but didn't come up with it.

 

[Patrick Miller]

Thanks Bill-
Here is the video url
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OXQ8hj-uic
-pat

 

[Bill Boehme]

I, too, will be curious if this solves the issue. I am fighting with my OW1640 which I bought used (several years old with very few hours use) in February and has had an annoying squeal from about 4-500rpm and up (no vibration that I can tell). Seems more electrical in nature than mechanical although it comes from the center of the motor. I pulled the fan side end bell off the motor and popped the grease seal off the bearing- appears to be in show room condition as does the whole lathe. I have emailed at length with Kevin at OW and Frank McCabe at ONdrive (OW drive supplier) checking the drive parameters especially carrier frequency but the noise is still there. I even posted a YouTube video so they could hear the noise. I have heard of motor/vfd compatibility issues so just purchased a NOS motor of a different brand (Reliance vs OEM Marathon) off Ebay at a low price and will wire that up and see if this changes things. Shotgun diagnostics but although helpful neither of the gentlemen I have talked with have been able to offer a definitive answer. I will post my results also.
thanks
--pat

Most squealing sounds come from the belt when it gets old and stiff -- especially if it has worn to the point there to top of the ribs are bottoming out in the grooves.

 

[Patrick Miller]

Thanks Bill-
In my case I get the same noise w/ the motor removed and lying on the floor
-pat

 

[Royce Wallace]

noise

Dale, sounds just like a noise I had in my 2036. Sound started a low r's and increased to about 12-300. Made no difference where the belt was located. For me it turns out the motor adjustment assembly was loose on the front mtg., which I soved with two neopreme washer each side of the upright adj. mount. Take two differnt sizes---but the cure is final and the noise is gone! It works for me any way.

 

[Bill Luce]

Most squealing sounds come from the belt when it gets old and stiff -- especially if it has worn to the point there to top of the ribs are bottoming out in the grooves.

Belts are a pretty easy thing to isolate as a problem generally.

Patrick, that is a different sound than the problem one I was referring to. Yours is more noticeably and more a buzzy sound. And got to love that loud bearing sound as well.

Royce, that front motor tensioner and assembly is the first thing I check on a 2436 when it starts making a noise. Typically if you disable the switch so you can run the lathe with the motor cover open you can push on the lever, etc and change the sound enough to isolate the culprit - very carefully of course. Minor rattle there pretty common, and usually just repositioning the tensioning lever can stop the rattle. Sounds scary the first time one hears it, but usually doesn't take the next step yours took.

 

[Bill Boehme]

Thanks Bill-
In my case I get the same noise w/ the motor removed and lying on the floor
-pat

In that case, I would suspect that something in the motor is vibrating. It could be a number of things, but a possible suspect is that there might be some looseness between the stator windings and lamination stack. That problem could be fixed using Glyptal 1202 -- an insulating high-temperature alkyd varnish that used to be made by General Electric. It has been a very long time since I built any transformers or rewound a motor and GE spun off the Glypal division in 1985 so I would not know where to find the stuff now. However, I suspect that a motor rewinding shop would have it or an equivalent product and be able to fix the problem if that is the issue. They could also check the motor for any other loose parts. Loose laminations is the usual cause of noise from a transformer so I would suspect that the same is true for a motor.

 

[Patrick Miller]

I received the motor on Friday and wired it up- just removed the wires from the existing motor and wired up to the new while it was lying on the floor. Same exact noise. I guess it's ear plugs or a new VFD for me. The upside is I have a spare motor...........

 

[Owen Lowe]

Thanks Bill-
Here is the video url
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OXQ8hj-uic
-pat

Sounds like a hatch of cicadas!

 

[Patrick Miller]

never thought of checking for bugs!!