Router speed controller / Sewing Machine Motor wiring help

[Chris Turner]

Hello all,

So, I know that there are plenty of posts about people wanting to use some sort of dimmer switch/speed control with their sewing machine motors... however, none of them seem to detail the wiring of such a setup (well, maybe for the dimmer switches, but I've seen where some say those aren't even really safe to use with a SM motor).

Here goes: I'd like to use this Harbor Freight Router Speed Controller with my sewing machine motor. How would one go about wiring this up to work without killing one's self?

I suppose I could just keep the foot pedal in the mix and keep it pressed down all the way, but use the speed controller to vary the speed. But, I'd really like to just use the speed controller and do away with the foot pedal.


Thanks in advance.

[Jazz P Bass]

Wire up the switch for Normally Closed.
Step on it to Stop.

[John_H]

Is there a pigtail coming out from the motor? You should only need to attach a two or three prong plug to it, and plug it in to the controller. How is the winder coming along Chris?

[Chris Turner]

Is there a pigtail coming out from the motor? You should only need to attach a two or three prong plug to it, and plug it in to the controller. How is the winder coming along Chris?

Heh... now I feel dumb. I wrote the question while at work without the motor in front of me.

Yeah, I can just plug the motor into the speed controller directly. For some reason, I was thinking I would have to mess with the light/motor plug thing that the pedal is attached to.


My current winder just barely gets the job done, so for this next winder I'm going to do things right and make some improvements based on what I've learned from my first one. I picked up this vintage belt-driven bench grinder that I'm going to use as a base for something much like this:


I plan to have Bruce Johnson make some faceplates for me after he gets through the madness of NAMM.

[Bruce Johnson]

Hey Chris;

A quick suggestion, now that I see what you are doing. If I make the face plate for you out of 3" diameter aluminum, I can easily cut a V-groove around the OD of it. Then it can act as the driven pulley to power the spindle.

Those sewing machine motors typically run up to about 6000-7000 rpm, which is obviously way too fast for winding. Most of those motors come with a small v-groove pulley already on the shaft, about 1" diameter. Belt that up to the 3" face plate, and run it through your speed controller, and you'll get a spindle speed range of 0-2000 rpm. That's about what you want for a winder. Stepping it down 3:1 like that will give the controller a much better range of adjustment.

For the drive belt, use a silicone rubber O-ring. You can get them in all different cross-sectional diameters and overall diameters. You'd want one about 1/4" dia (cross-section) x 6" dia. The silicone O-ring will have plenty of traction to drive the winder, without much side tension. It's silent running and will last for decades. I've had one set of blue flourosilicone rubber O-rings running on my engraving machine for 15 years so far. The orange silicone rings will work fine too. The black Buna-N O-rings (the normal O-rings) will work, but only for a year or two. Get the silicone.

[Slobrain]

Hey Chris;

A quick suggestion, now that I see what you are doing. If I make the face plate for you out of 3" diameter aluminum, I can easily cut a V-groove around the OD of it. Then it can act as the driven pulley to power the spindle.

Those sewing machine motors typically run up to about 6000-7000 rpm, which is obviously way too fast for winding. Most of those motors come with a small v-groove pulley already on the shaft, about 1" diameter. Belt that up to the 3" face plate, and run it through your speed controller, and you'll get a spindle speed range of 0-2000 rpm. That's about what you want for a winder. Stepping it down 3:1 like that will give the controller a much better range of adjustment.

For the drive belt, use a silicone rubber O-ring. You can get them in all different cross-sectional diameters and overall diameters. You'd want one about 1/4" dia (cross-section) x 6" dia. The silicone O-ring will have plenty of traction to drive the winder, without much side tension. It's silent running and will last for decades. I've had one set of blue flourosilicone rubber O-rings running on my engraving machine for 15 years so far. The orange silicone rings will work fine too. The black Buna-N O-rings (the normal O-rings) will work, but only for a year or two. Get the silicone.

Bruce,

are you talking about the faceplates like on this video?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfv1Mbzc5zE

[big_teee]

In the thread listed below, post 36 shows the faceplate that I think Bruce made for Copperhead.
Maybe Copper won't mind me linking to it. It looks great.
http://music-electronics-forum.com/t35617/
T

[Bruce Johnson]

Yes, that one that Tee referred to was made by me. That's a simple low cost design for small plates, like 3". It's just a slug of 3" bar stock, trued up and accurately bored for the spindle shaft. I can also make up face plates with a smaller hub and thinner front plate surface, if that's what you want. It's just more machining time ($) to hog off that aluminum. Either way, it would be easy to cut a groove around the outside to make it also function as a pulley.

[Chris Turner]

Hey Chris;

A quick suggestion, now that I see what you are doing. If I make the face plate for you out of 3" diameter aluminum, I can easily cut a V-groove around the OD of it. Then it can act as the driven pulley to power the spindle.

Those sewing machine motors typically run up to about 6000-7000 rpm, which is obviously way too fast for winding. Most of those motors come with a small v-groove pulley already on the shaft, about 1" diameter. Belt that up to the 3" face plate, and run it through your speed controller, and you'll get a spindle speed range of 0-2000 rpm. That's about what you want for a winder. Stepping it down 3:1 like that will give the controller a much better range of adjustment.

For the drive belt, use a silicone rubber O-ring. You can get them in all different cross-sectional diameters and overall diameters. You'd want one about 1/4" dia (cross-section) x 6" dia. The silicone O-ring will have plenty of traction to drive the winder, without much side tension. It's silent running and will last for decades. I've had one set of blue flourosilicone rubber O-rings running on my engraving machine for 15 years so far. The orange silicone rings will work fine too. The black Buna-N O-rings (the normal O-rings) will work, but only for a year or two. Get the silicone.

I'm currently using a silicone o-ring, actually. :-) Works great!

The pulley that's on my sewing machine motor now is 5/16" diameter at the point where the belt sits in. By the looks of the bench grinder's central pulley, given the shaft is 1/2", I'm guessing that pulley is about 1 1/2" diameter. That gives me a ~1:4.8 gear ratio, which might work out. But I guess putting a groove on one of the faceplates (I'll probably have you make me 2 of them) would be fine too... gives me an option to try out.


So I went and bought the speed controller. I was expecting it to go from 0 to whatever-RPMs. It doesn't. It actually starts off at probably a few hundred RPM and goes up from there. No matter though... with a good gear ratio, it should be fine.