Puzzled, what is going on?

R

rlpeterson78

New member
I have had my Clearvue for many years. I have had some problems with the motor recently and discovered that the starting capacitor was blown. I took both the run and starting capacitor into a local motor shop and the clerk confirmed that the starting capacitor was blown but tested the run capacitor and said that it was still good. I came home and removed the small capacitor on the top of the old one and soldered it in place on the new one. I then tried to fire up the machine and it blew the fuse. I have checked and confirmed that all the wire from the fuse box to the motor were intact and carrying the current to the motor. Has there been issues with these motors going bad?
 
Puzzled Update

Puzzled Update

So I took my cyclone apart and dismantled the motor from the motor mount and took it into a repair shop. They called me back and told me that the motor was burnt up and to repair it would cost $400. Even though I asked for a more detailed explaination, they didn't say anything but "Burnt". So since a new motor with shipping would cost about the same I elected to order a new motor from clearvue. :(
 
Agree, that is a bummer. CV appears to have the best price for 5hp motors so you should be good. It sounds like the failed start capacitor caused the motor to draw excessive current until it fried itself. It seems like it should have blown the circuit breaker before burning itself up. Can you double check the breaker just in case?

Steve
 
Hi Steve,

Before I took the cyclone apart and took it to the tool repair, I tried everything that I could to determine what was going on including replacing the 30 amp breaker. A brand spaking new one also tripped. I deattached the electric line from the motor and confirmed that the circut didn't trip unless it was connected to the motor. I checked the wiring to the motor numerous times to be sure I had it correct. And I took out a junction box that I had between the relay and the motor that I needed due the lenght of 10 guage wire I had and bought a new roll of wire to get rid of that to make it directly from the relay to the motor.

I bought my cyclone from the original owners of the company and it is in the brown MDF form. I have no record, nor does the current owners of the company of when I bought it, but it could be 2004. So the motor lasted about 11 years or so. But I can't help feeling that going from 125 ft above sea level in Massachusetts to above 4000 ft in Utah could have caused the problem. I know it wouldn't but I didn't seem to have an issue with it until I set it up here. Now hopefully it will work as I expected.

Best,

Ron
 
Hi Ron,

It does look like you have all your safety issues covered. I bought mine from Ed in 2010 and it is also the brown unpainted MDF. Still works great.

I am an electrical engineer and I can't think of anything in a motor or the wiring that would be damaged by running it at 4000' elevation. If anything, the slightly thinner air would be less of a load on the motor and it will use slightly less current. However, 4000' would not have enough of a difference in pressure to be noticeable. The difference would probably be less than 5%. It may have just been old age and the capacitor failed.

Hope all works out with the new motor.

Steve
 
I got my new motor and put it in the cyclone. Now things work perfectly; breaker isn't triping, fires up and steady vacuum pull.

So if any one out there has a motor speed up and slow down then starts tripping the breaker, get a new motor.

Best to all and Happy Holidays

Ron
 
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