VFD Recommendations

[Keith ChartersParticipant @keithcharters25446]

Hi, Our society has just been donated a Myford ML7 lathe. It is in working condition but, it is fitted with a 3 phase motor and we do not have the matching VFD! The motor has the following markings

kW 0.37, HP 0.5, RPM 1425, Volts 240/415, PH 3, HZ 50, AMP 2.0/1.2, Class B, DUTY CONT. We would like to source a suitable VFD for this motor so can anyone recommend one. TIA.

 

 

[John HaineParticipant @johnhaine32865]

People rate Drives Supermarket who can apparently give good advice as well.  Or contact Newton Tesla for a turnkey controller. They normally supply with a motor but may be able to just supply the drive.

 

[IanTParticipant @iant]

I’ve recently purchased from (Inverter) Drives Supermarket and was very pleased with the price (and advice) I received from them.

I opted for a 0.75kw TEC motor & matching Invertek Optidrive VFD. You sound like you just need an Inverter and checking the IDS website, a .37kw Inverter will start at about £85 (inc VAT) plus shipping.

However, I also ordered some other bits and pieces that IDS suggested I would need that I think you might also find useful.

They included a:

* A Control Pendant Kit – Fwd/Rev, Run/Stop & Speed

*  Mersen CMC 1 Pole Fuse Holder and Neutral Link for 32A barrel fuses

* 2m of 3phase ‘SY’ power cable

* Qty 1 Nylon M20 gland & Qty 1 ‘EMC’ metal M20 gland.

As I am busy with installing DROs at the moment (between decorating – my core mission atm) I’ve not been able to run everything up yet – but IDS provide both a VFD manual and a very clear “Easy Start Guide” as PDF downloads – so it’s very useful to be able to review these before ordering.

As far as I can tell, my VFD set-up is at least equal in spec to the ‘RTR’ offers available and over £100 less than one of those options (and less than half the price of the best known one). IDS is also based here in the UK of course.

If you email them, they may take a little time to get back to you, as the ‘support’ guy only works certain days but he’s very helpful. I sent a him a number of emails and he also called me back about one particular concern to talk me through it.

Regards,

 

IanT

[Clive Brown 1Participant @clivebrown1]

Agree Inverter Drives Supermarket is the go-to one stop shop. It may be useful to buy a vfd from them that has their quick start guide as a pdf which makes control wiring and programming very straightforward, much more comprehensible than the manufacturer’s instructions.

[BazyleParticipant @bazyle]

You are lucky that your motor specifies a 240v option (edit : this is still 3 phase not regular domestic 240) which means you will be able to easily reconfigure it. There have been a couple of threads on here recently about this.

[HollowpointParticipant @hollowpoint]

I can vouch for inverter drive supermarket. I’ve had 3 drives from them now. Very happy with the service.

I always recommend the “Invertek” drives, they are easy to set up, very reliable, made in the UK and look cool in purple too! 😂

Here you go matey, only £53 at the minute! Bargain!

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

Try Newton-Tesla. I don’t know if they can supply it for a motor specified by the owner, but they do make inverter . controllers specifically for Myford lathes.

Mine has one, and N-T sets of a different type grace three others of my machine-tools.

[southernchapParticipant @southernchap]

If someone can’t manage to look at their motor data plate, do a little research, pick a VFD, and then wire it up themselves, then they should probably go to someone like Newton Tesla and accept they just have to pay the “incompetence tax”.

Honestly though, decent quality VFDs these days are so easy to fit and wire up, I’d be a bit concerned about letting someone who couldn’t do it, loose on a machine tool.

I was really impressed with inverter supermarket and I’d definitely recommend those guys.

[southernchap]

On southernchap Said:

If someone can’t manage to look at their motor data plate, do a little research, pick a VFD, and then wire it up themselves, then they should probably go to someone like Newton Tesla and accept they just have to pay the “incompetence tax”.

Honestly though, decent quality VFDs these days are so easy to fit and wire up, I’d be a bit concerned about letting someone who couldn’t do it, loose on a machine tool.

I was really impressed with inverter supermarket and I’d definitely recommend those guys.

Southernchap

First paragraph is a little unfair I think. Looking up the data, doing a bit of research and getting ready to order a VFD is one thing. Having that extra bit of confidence to trust what you have done and order up something you’ve never used, bought or fitted before is another.

Sensible to ask for advice before your first rodeo. Especially when fitting may involve stretching core skills that are, in fact, well up to the job in a new direction.

This sort of thing is yet another example if the “Third Time is the Charm” thing. Most folk have to do something three times before they are confident in a general sort of way of the approach needed for a respectably straightforward job.

Another vote for Inverter Drive Supermarket and their easy set-up PDF documentation. Saved me some work over the years as I can confidently point folk who want to get me involved to IDS (unless I really don’t trust their wiring skills).

The list of little extras given by IanT just makes life that bit easier. Heck I’ll probably buy a control pendant next time although I’ve always made my own before. Thos things used to be expensive.

Clive

[Clive Foster]

On Clive Foster Said:

On southernchap Said:

If someone can’t manage to look at their motor data plate, do a little research, pick a VFD, and then wire it up themselves, then they should probably go to someone like Newton Tesla and accept they just have to pay the “incompetence tax”.

Honestly though, decent quality VFDs these days are so easy to fit and wire up, I’d be a bit concerned about letting someone who couldn’t do it, loose on a machine tool.

I was really impressed with inverter supermarket and I’d definitely recommend those guys.

Southernchap

First paragraph is a little unfair I think. Looking up the data, doing a bit of research and getting ready to order a VFD is one thing. Having that extra bit of confidence to trust what you have done and order up something you’ve never used, bought or fitted before is another.

Sensible to ask for advice before your first rodeo. Especially when fitting may involve stretching core skills that are, in fact, well up to the job in a new direction.

Eh, you may be right, I’ll hold my hands up here😳.  My post probably wasn’t as kindly worded as it could have been.

To be fair, I was mainly expressing frustration at the regular lack of confidence I see on here about electrical work.

I’m convinced pretty much everyone on here that can use a lathe competently, is capable of setting up a new, unmessed-with and decent quality* VFD in a basic way, absolutely correctly, the first time they attempt it.

Now, I’ll grant that if people want to do something like use the original controls on their lathe for example, that does takes more learning and thought. I’d say people’s first go-around probably should be using the controls on the from of the VFD.  However, wiring up the original controls often pretty much amounts to simple circuits and basic electronics.

There are tons of good quality videos** on YouTube about installing VFDs on machine tools, and if people do want to dig a little deeper, there are great videos on the fundamentals of AC, both single and three phase, and the various types of AC motors that will get an absolute beginner where they need to be.

In 1975 say, if, as a layperson, you wanted to run a three phase machine from a single phase domestic supply, it was off to the local library you’d go, and if you were lucky there’d be a few nights of reading, scratching your head, and experimentation (some of it potentially rather ‘exciting’ and potentially rather expensive🫣😄).

These days, with the informational resources we have at our fingertips, the relative inexpensiveness of components, and the capabilities of quite affordable VFDs, it’s never been so easy.

I’ll be frank here, the part of Newton Tesla’s business that relates to hobbyists, is entirely dependent on an entirely unnecessary lack of confidence on the part of our ‘community’.  I really don’t like that.

If I can manage this, with my ADHD (albeit mitigated with pretty effective medication) brain, without destroying motors, setting VFDs on fire, or tripping the breakers, then I reckon anyone on here can. 😳😄👍

 

*This is absolutely key.  I previously bought a supposedly “new, open box”  1.5 kW, 220V 1PH in, 220V 3PH out VFD, off eBay at a good, but not absolute steal price.  It was Chinese, but ostensibly from a brand that was of an industrial quality, which to buy new, would be around £350.

I wasted weeks of fiddling with various parameters, which were definitely not default factory values, in an attempt to get it to work in SVC mode.  The autodetect motor parameters seemed to work a charm, everything matched what I’d measured, but the motor just wouldn’t run smoothly.

It would have been easier if the various reset to factory default parameter values worked, but none of them appeared to clear down everything.  Even with a manual that matched the firmware version indicated on the label, I never got it to work and in the end I gave it up as a bad job and sold the VFD (making it clear that the SVC mode was simply not playing ball, but that it worked fine in plain VF mode, which it did).

 

**so videos that were made a couple of years ago or earlier; I have no problem with AI, I use it at work as an unpaid junior, wet-behind-the-ears software developer for writing unit tests, and also for spotting optimisations or bugs I might have missed and it saves me loads of time, even with the rigourous reviewing of its work, you have to do, but AI slop makes my urine boil!

[Clive FosterParticipant @clivefoster55965]

Southernchap

Bottom line is that it takes a different sort of confidence to be happy that simply connecting wires in the right order will make things work without a couple of hundred quid or more worth of magic smoke coming out than it does to do something mechanical where you can actually see what the bits do. Turning by hand if need be.

Objectively wiring a VFD is no harder than wiring a plug so the confidence should follow right over. But as you say all too often it doesn’t. Suspect that is mostly due to folk feeling that wiring plug is simple enough to be a rote thing, painting by numbers so to speak, with no proper understanding beyond getting the wires in the right order needed. Faced with a VFD with all that extra magic in the box it feels that more knowledge is needed before specifying, buying and connecting.

Actually it isn’t.

I just connect the wires in order too and generally do just fine. Well I’ve not let the magic smoke out.

Yet!

Probably not dissimilar to the way some folk can happily work off the dials when bringing to size yet others need (several) micrometer checks en-route.

Clive

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