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Hello all.
Back in 1995, I purchased an Enco 110-1340 (13X40) lathe at the Enco store in San Jose, CA. This was just before the closed their brick and mortar stores and went online. I had little to no knowledge of lathes at the time and, in particular, their electrical controls. Therein lies a tale.
My wife and I took it home in the crate and after much wrangling and hoisting with a ceiling chain hoist and and engine lift, the machine was duly set up and leveled nicely. There it has sat for the past 22 years.
I had to open the electrical cabinet on the rear of the gear case in order to connect the 240 Volt cable into the panel. The manual that came with it only showed this in the barest of terms, but I managed to get it done. At the time, I took one look at the electrical panel with it's various contactors and was immediately terrified. I vowed never to look in there again unless absolutely necessary. After that the lathe worked perfectly aver since.
Fast forward to the first week of July of this year. I went out to use the lathe and noticed that there was no red light when I turned it on. There was also the faint odor of burning shellac. I immediately unplugged the power cable and removed the four screws securing the cover of the panel. The panel was partially burned up. The control transformer which converts 240 Volts to 120 Volts for the contactors was black and the wires leading to it were partially melted. Also I noticed that of the three contactors, only one would move when the moving portion was pressed it. In other words, a disaster.
I began checking the manual for some clue as to what happened. After some digging and comparing of the manual to the actual panel, I discovered that:
1. There were no fuses. (What I had thought was an overload relay was actually only a combination job contactor and on-off-emergency stop contactor) For the record, there were no fuses shown on the electrical schematic that was shown for 240 Volts, single phase hookup.
2. The primary side of the control transformer was loaded on all of the time with 240 Volts, even when the machine itself was shot off. It had been drawing current for all those years and finally the windings gave out and fed 240 volts into the 120 circuit taking out two of the three contactors.
(Remember, I said above that I had no real knowledge of lathe electrical panels so go easy, LOL.
)
So, what to do, what to do, what to do? I first called MSC which bought Enco and closed it down a while back. I asked the person on the phone about a control transformer and some contactors and after checking he told me that there were no such parts showing in their inventory. No dice.
Next call was to Grizzy because their 4016 lathe is basically the same unit. I was told that the control transformer was available to order for $70 but was backordered with no definite date. I thanked the lady and hung up.
With that in mind I had two choices: Rebuild the panel myself or scrap the lathe. I chose to rebuild it.
Make a long story short, I got on Amazon and eBay and a week later, I had a matching pair of 4 pole contactors (3 normally open and one normally closed) for forward and reverse with reversing protection, two 2 pole contactors for jogging and on-off emergency stop. I also got fuse holders and built a 240 Volt switch unit to shut the power off completely when the lathe is not in use. I already had an Acme control transformer that mounts outside of the panel and I added a fan, as well. I also had to add 2" to the back of the panel to provide room for the fan and air circulation. I made the terminal board out of cloth phenolic sheeting that I had. The posts are 10-32 brass redi-rod.
A week later, I had the machine up and running again. The main point of this post is to suggest to Enco and possibly Grizzly lathe owners that they check and make sure that all power is shut off when the machine is not being used. It might also be good to see whether there are any fuses.
Comments gratefully accepted but be gentle.
EDIT: Sorry about the photos. I will try to get some photos up on the site ASAP.
Back in 1995, I purchased an Enco 110-1340 (13X40) lathe at the Enco store in San Jose, CA. This was just before the closed their brick and mortar stores and went online. I had little to no knowledge of lathes at the time and, in particular, their electrical controls. Therein lies a tale.
My wife and I took it home in the crate and after much wrangling and hoisting with a ceiling chain hoist and and engine lift, the machine was duly set up and leveled nicely. There it has sat for the past 22 years.
I had to open the electrical cabinet on the rear of the gear case in order to connect the 240 Volt cable into the panel. The manual that came with it only showed this in the barest of terms, but I managed to get it done. At the time, I took one look at the electrical panel with it's various contactors and was immediately terrified. I vowed never to look in there again unless absolutely necessary. After that the lathe worked perfectly aver since.
Fast forward to the first week of July of this year. I went out to use the lathe and noticed that there was no red light when I turned it on. There was also the faint odor of burning shellac. I immediately unplugged the power cable and removed the four screws securing the cover of the panel. The panel was partially burned up. The control transformer which converts 240 Volts to 120 Volts for the contactors was black and the wires leading to it were partially melted. Also I noticed that of the three contactors, only one would move when the moving portion was pressed it. In other words, a disaster.
I began checking the manual for some clue as to what happened. After some digging and comparing of the manual to the actual panel, I discovered that:
1. There were no fuses. (What I had thought was an overload relay was actually only a combination job contactor and on-off-emergency stop contactor) For the record, there were no fuses shown on the electrical schematic that was shown for 240 Volts, single phase hookup.
2. The primary side of the control transformer was loaded on all of the time with 240 Volts, even when the machine itself was shot off. It had been drawing current for all those years and finally the windings gave out and fed 240 volts into the 120 circuit taking out two of the three contactors.
(Remember, I said above that I had no real knowledge of lathe electrical panels so go easy, LOL.
)So, what to do, what to do, what to do? I first called MSC which bought Enco and closed it down a while back. I asked the person on the phone about a control transformer and some contactors and after checking he told me that there were no such parts showing in their inventory. No dice.
Next call was to Grizzy because their 4016 lathe is basically the same unit. I was told that the control transformer was available to order for $70 but was backordered with no definite date. I thanked the lady and hung up.
With that in mind I had two choices: Rebuild the panel myself or scrap the lathe. I chose to rebuild it.
Make a long story short, I got on Amazon and eBay and a week later, I had a matching pair of 4 pole contactors (3 normally open and one normally closed) for forward and reverse with reversing protection, two 2 pole contactors for jogging and on-off emergency stop. I also got fuse holders and built a 240 Volt switch unit to shut the power off completely when the lathe is not in use. I already had an Acme control transformer that mounts outside of the panel and I added a fan, as well. I also had to add 2" to the back of the panel to provide room for the fan and air circulation. I made the terminal board out of cloth phenolic sheeting that I had. The posts are 10-32 brass redi-rod.
A week later, I had the machine up and running again. The main point of this post is to suggest to Enco and possibly Grizzly lathe owners that they check and make sure that all power is shut off when the machine is not being used. It might also be good to see whether there are any fuses.
Comments gratefully accepted but be gentle.
EDIT: Sorry about the photos. I will try to get some photos up on the site ASAP.
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