cannon barrel making lathes

[accuratemike]

Huzza VFD's! Greatest thing since sliced bread. I'll never use a convertor again. I think static's lose 1/3 rated power, rotaries don't. My VFD was about the same money as a rotary of the same size. As a bonus you can toss your switch because F/R and speed from 0 to many times sane are available on the keypad. You can program in tons of thing like start-up rate and such. I use 1% of it's capabilities. Mine is an AutomationDirect GS2. There are lots to shop/choose from. MIKE

http://web5.automationdirect.com/adc/Shopping/Catalog/AC_Drives_-z-_Motors
http://web5.automationdirect.com/adc/Shopping/Catalog/AC_Drives_-z-_Motors/GS2_(115_-z-_230_-z-_460_-z-_575_VAC_V-z-Hz_Control)

[Cat Whisperer]

There are some advantages to the rotary converters - namely cost.  (The static types shouldn't be used with motors that are started often - tends to burn them out).  But my rotary (with 5hp or so idler) will run 7hp  (start one at a time).  That for several hundred less than the VFD.  But for lesser hp the cost is competitive.

[accuratemike]

"That for several hundred less than the VFD"

Heck, my VFD didn't cost several hundred dollars (not even $200). I looked at 3hp the other day and they are sub $300. I have a friend with a 10hp in his garage, using a VFD. I don't know the specifics, but the VFD was less expensive than a same size rotary. And they do DO alot more than just convert phases. If you have not looked at them in a while, you should look again. Alot has happened in the VFD realm recently. They are smarter and more affordable. MIKE

[Cat Whisperer]

I used that figrure from the HP equivalent VFD price (from your link) and compared to what I paid for my rotary.

AND that's what I meant by the smaller HP VFD's being a more cost effective.

[GGaskill]

George, is there anything you don't know?       Would you be so kind as to give us a little story about what you do and how you know what you know?

I rolled past 60 YOA last December.  I have been a maker of things since as far back as I can remember.  I was enrolled in engineering in college but my natural distaste for the education industry combined with Lyndon Johnson's little escapade in Southeast Asia to get me out of college and I never went back.  I had taken a computer programming class during the summer in 1963 and then worked in the field for a few years while in college.  Upon my return to civilian life, I got an entry level programming job and have been in the field ever since.  I have been a CICS systems programmer since the mid-70's which is one reason why I am not afraid of computer stuff. 

Yet there are vast quantities of things I don't know.  One could start with virtually anything about Hollywood (I watch no TV or movies and don't buy tabloid "news" papers.)  But this gives me time to learn about the things that interest me, so I have spent a lot of time on the Practical Machinist website, and taken many machine tool technology and welding classes at the local junior college and read a number of machinist oriented textbooks.  The general education industry these days is highly overrated.  You can get the books from the library, read them yourself, and know as much as some child who borrowed $40,000 to enrich a bunch of college professors.

And I have bought lathes and milling machines, etc., instead of 60" TV sets and so on.  It's a question of interests and priorities, and since I don't have to maintain domestic tranquility with anyone (no kids or wives), I can please myself without offending anyone other than those socialists who know what's best for me even though they know nothing about me.

[Cannonmaker]

George, I like your life sketch. sounds like time spent learing your own way, the way you enjoy most.  I watch TV in the evenings to relax,  although I'm always reading a book (not story books), the paper or working on cannon plans the same time.  Few  TV shows hold my interest on their own.

My wife gets mad at me because I allways leave books, Metals, Physic, Chemistry and Cannon and Civil War, by my recliner.  What I don't read is books on spelling.  It just dos'net click for me.

Rick Neff