Hey guys, hoping someone can help shed some light on this controller and what may be wrong with it. I've got a control board that turns single phase 115v into 3 phase 230v, the unit will start up and run the motor for about 15 to 30 seconds and then will shut down. It will randomly start the motor back up but the led status light will blink red which I was told by tech support that it was a faulty controller that is no longer made. Does anything on this board stand out to cause this issue? Images are being uploaded now.

 

 

Nothing looks burned and I do not see any poor solder connections, BUT that means nothing at all.
If it always shuts down after 30 second that is a clue that there is a problem somewhere in the startup sequence. But the problem may also be in changing over to the run mode.
I do see a few solder connections that do not look right, towards the bottom of the photo of the solder side. So re-soldering all of the connections that are not nice and shiny is an easy thing to try, and, if it fixes the problem very good. If not, it still was a good guess, and did not cost a lot.

 

Nothing looks burned and I do not see any poor solder connections, BUT that means nothing at all.
If it always shuts down after 30 second that is a clue that there is a problem somewhere in the startup sequence. But the problem may also be in changing over to the run mode.

Any idea in what controls this start-up? From what I've seen of the controller, it appears to ramp the 3 phase 1 hp 3450 rpm motor up. Upon 1st startup from it being off a week while waiting on a new impeller (in which it wasn't working correctly before, the impeller was making noise so it was replaced) it started up, the frequency ramped up and down for a bit as it built pressure in the system. After the first time it ran and built pressure, it stopped and dropped pressure. After it kicks off after about 20 seconds of running it will randomly start back up and run for another 20 seconds but will never run long enough to build pressure. I've replaced caps on ECM modules and the such but I'm not seeing any signs of bad caps or burnt traces.

 

OK, now we see that the load is increasing as it is starting. And if the pump impeller has replaced one that was not delivering what it should, then probably the load is quite a bit greater now. Is there a way to relieve the pump pressure until the motor is up to speed?? Now the symptom is an overload causing a shut down. Pump and compressor duty can be rather severe.

 

What is the nature of the pump? radial impeller type?
Are you in N.A. ? If so you should have access to 240 1ph, these types are a little better for VFD operation than the 120v

 

The pump is for increasing building water pressure. I'm in N.A. but this is what I'm having to try to repair. This drive powers a 3phase 230v 3450 rpm motor which is connected to a Gould's Water Technology 5SV3TC4F20. It spins easily by hand so I thought maybe whatever on the board that is doing the phase change is going bad perhaps? The clinic said it will randomly trip the 20 amp breaker. This may be well above my head and if so I can send it to get checked by a board repair shop.

 

It may be that the load on the pump is requiring more power than the motor can deliver. Is this a new installation, or has it been performing properly up until recently?? If that is the case, has something else changed??
AND, certainly,using a 115 volt singe phase to 230 volt 3phase drive is a bit of a stretch. POwer in will always be a bit more than power out. That sometimes is a big problem.

 

We started managing the property at the beginning of this month, the initial pump assembly was built around 2015. Upon introducing ourselves and inquiring about any issues they had, poor water pressure was brought up, we inspected the pressure booster and you could hear a noticeable noise coming from the impeller assembly but the pump was not working correctly. We replaced the impeller assembly and it sounds much better but the led status light blinks red after the motor stops running (tech support told us that meant the controller was bad) if you let it sit for 5-10 minutes the motor will start up again and run for maybe 20 seconds then drop back out. The LED light status legend does not even list a continuous blinking red LED. I'm amazed they were able to turn a single phase into 3 phase. It looks like it takes 115v +/-10 1 phase at 15amps and can turn it into 0-230v 3 phase at 4.2 amps from the label.

 

Is it possible for the TS to actually measure the input current, such as with an accurate clamp on ammeter? And then measure each of the three phase currents? The reason could be that there is a bit of an electrical connection issue.
I was once asked to solve the problem of one hydraulic pump motor tripping the overload while the other three, (all pumping in parallel) had no problems. The fault was one slightly loose connection screw in one of the connections. A half turn tighter on that screw solved the problem immediately.
My point being that any phase imbalance from any source can certainly cause a problem such as a single phase overload.
Difficult to discover, simple to fix.
And since the motor may have been disconnected or disturbed during the pump repair, the connections are a reasonable place to check, with the clamp on meter being the simple method.

 

Hey guys, hoping someone can help shed some light on this controller and what may be wrong with it. I've got a control board that turns single phase 115v into 3 phase 230v, the unit will start up and run the motor for about 15 to 30 seconds and then will shut down.

Reminds me of a problem I had with a new installation of a wash tank that had the centrifugal radial type 3ph pump.
On start up, the pump would run for a few secs and then trip the breaker, On contacting the pump supplier, they suggested it was due to the pump outlet design being fully open and too short, causing this type of pump to O/L.
A slight restriction on the pump outlet, cured the problem.

 

Reminds me of a problem I had with a new installation of a wash tank that had the centrifugal radial type 3ph pump.
On start up, the pump would run for a few secs and then trip the breaker, On contacting the pump supplier, they suggested it was due to the pump outlet design being fully open and too short, causing this type of pump to O/L.
A slight restriction on the pump outlet, cured the problem.

THAT is one of the reasons to actually measure the current. Both at the drive's feed and at the motor connections. And a clamp on ammeter will be accurate enough.

 

THAT is one of the reasons to actually measure the current. Both at the drive's feed and at the motor connections. And a clamp on ammeter will be accurate enough.

I was aware of the over-current due to the O/L trip, it was the reason that was not so clear, at the time, anyway!

 

The breaker has not tripped while I've been at the facility for the past 19 days, so I was expecting it to be a controller issue. I thought maybe whatever it was using to convert the phases had worn out and was failing.

 

If you do need to replace it, I would look at using a 240vac version, most installations in N.A. have 240v 1ph.

 

The manufacturer no longer sells the 115v version, I'm just trying to help the client from spending $2400+ to replace the controller.

 

Okay, so now I have a new question that maybe someone can help me with. I let a board repair shop work on the board, they told me the small caps were bad so they replaced them. Upon powering the board back up one of the capacitors got hot and exploded, upon further investigation the shop had installed one of the capacitors backwards. Now the LED light does not even come on after they replaced this blown capacitor and I was told it was probably the IGBT relay. Does this sound accurate or did they fry the transformer or another component in installing this capacitor backwards?

 

If the LED still does not light when it should there is no telling what sort of additional damage may have been done.
My experience has been unfortunate in that the unknowing and incompetent individuals can do a whole lot of damage, and then try to excuse themselves by wailing "But I didn't know".

 

Well that doesn't sound good, perhaps that is why the board repair shop told me it was the IGBT and they couldn't source one so they were just refunding the entire $250 charge after they replaced the backwards cap and it didn't work.

 

Without seeing the circuit is is a challenge to even guess. But I can make a suggestion, which is to check the other components in that part of the circuit. Some part could have acted like a fuse and opened up without any obvious damage. If that is a resistor or a diode you should be able to replace it without resorting to the repair shop again.