V, and Horace of course,
Got out the original ball bearing motor which works, and connected a high
current transformer of indeterminate turns ratio (made it myself years ago, do
not remember). Technical details of the transformer are below:
Core: several spools worth of iron rebar tie wire wound in a donut shape. Maybe
a foot across.
Primary: 10AWG THHN stranded. Number of turns...a lot.
Secondary: 6 turns of "some heavy wire". Really, half of a pair of auto jumper
cables.
Visual appearance: looks like a chocolate donut with some red jelly leaking
from one side. Suggestion... use to attract cops if broken down on side of
road. But one half of a jumper cable set won't do much, will it?
Primary goes to 120VAC. Secondary across the BB motor.
When run normally (with flywheel) the motor will spin in either direction, and
will end up steady at maybe 150 rpm. Heating is not too bad now. I do need to
tweak the turns of the secondary to find optimum "feed" for the motor. I do
have the temptation to run 240VAC across the primary, as my lab is wired for a
rather robust bit of that.
Interesting and unexpected thing: when the flywheel was removed, and current
was applied, I tried to see if the motor would spin with just the shaft. It
doesn't...but there is a torque produced. If you do it right, the shaft will
oscillate back and forth, CW...CCW...CW...CCW...etc. maybe 60 degrees. Back and
forth, back and forth. Thermal oscillation of some kind? Or not getting over a
'hill' of mechanical resistance at some point along the bearing's race? Either
way, it wasn't expected, and was fun to play with.
Horace, if you think it warrants it, I'll tweak the transformer to get it
working more optimally. I do have some high current rectifiers. Can probably
rectify the juice, if needed.
--Kyle
