ESL-IE-97-04-07

ELECTRIC MOTOR MAINTENANCE & REPAIR FOR LONG TERM EFFICIENCY Wallace P. Brithinee President Brithinee Electric Colton, California

ABSTRACT
Energy costs to operate electric motors can be a significant part of an operating budget. For example, a recent survey of California water departments reveals energy costs for pumping and treating water may be 25% of operating costs. Strategies to reduce these costs include reducing the operating time (turning offunnec essary equipment), using controls to match pump out put with demand, optimizing motor systems, and in stalling energy-efficient motors. To effect these measures, the end-user (a water de partment, for example) may use microprocessor-based devices (for logic control); power electronics (for mo tor speed control); and specially-built electric motors. These devices may require different maintenance pro cedures than the equipment used in the past, and repair practices on electric motors may require special care in order to maintain the efficiency value to which they were originally manufactured. This paper will focus on the three-phase electric motor maintenance and repair issues, with comments on the interaction with electronic drives.

In creating a maintenance policy, an industrial fmn should target 100% uptime and communicate that to both vendors and employees. Another target which some industries have set is a 50% reduction of motor repair cost. Budgets may include increases in preventive main tenance measures. One useful tool in meeting these goals is a data base of the installed motors. This should include such information as nameplate data, age of equipment, hours of operation or load profile, maintenance records, and failure analysis. The US Department of Energy's MotorMaster+ software package allows for some of this, plus analysis tools to assist in the repair/replace decision.

FAILURES AND MANAGING THEM

Electric motor failures are often thought to be burn outs. However, perhaps only a third of motor repairs involve rewinding. The majority of motor failures are initially mechanical in nature, usually involving bear ings. Electrical failures may then result. When a failure occurs, an economic opportunity arises, as there is usually a cost for removal and some decision must be made to repair or to replace. In the case of standard electric motors (usually the horizon tal, foot-mounted type, but also some of the vertical type), the cost ofremoval and installation is significant when compared with the cost of the motor itself, so the economic decision to replace with an energy-efficient motor may be attractive. These considerations require planning and the use of motor management tools to assist in making the right decision. And, if electronic drive systems were added since initial installation, this usually means there are new requirements on the motor that should further in fluence the specifications for repair or replacement.

THE REPAIR PROCESS The end-user of the motor should acquaint him self with the typical steps involved in the repair pro cess; the test equipment used for motor repair; and points to consider when evaluating a motor repair fa cility. It is essential that the repair firm have equipment appropriate for the range of motor sizes to be repaired, and that the equipment be used properly. Test instru ments should be regularly calibrated, and traceable to national standards. Ovens should be calibrated and maintained for proper process control.
The Electrical Apparatus Service Association (EASA) has developed the EASA-Q Quality Manage ment System to assist members in establishing and documenting their quality procedures. EASA-Q in cludes all elements of ISO 9002-1994 as well as spe cific procedures for motor repair. Four lead assessors are available around North America for assisting facil ity assessment or certification. Once a service center is selected for the repair of a motor, the end-user should provide to the repair firm a contact name of a person familiar with the machine's symptoms, instructions or specifications, time expec tations, and any special cautions for safety. Incoming inspection and testing by the repairer should identify the assembly position, missing parts, and special features. Here, a photograph or two can be very valuable. Testing should determine if rewinding will be required. Tests should include measurement of

Proceedings from the Nineteenth Industrial Energy Technology Conference, Houston, TX, April 23-24, 1997

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insulation resistance to ground with a megohmmeter. Turn-to-turn insulation integrity on the winding con ductors may be detennined by surge-test. Winding re sistance should be measured and recorded. Since origi nal factory winding resistance is not general1y on the nameplate nor easily obtained from manufacturers, these values usual1y are for comparison only.

If it is detennined that it's safe to apply power to the windings and the mechanical integrity of the frame and bearings is deemed satisfactory, then a no-load run test, first at reduced voltage, then at ful1-voltage, may be in order. At that time, base-line vibration readings should be made at each bearing housing in horizontal, vertical, and axial directions. Current on each phase should be measured and recorded. If it is detennined that the motor does not need rewinding, it should be disassembled with a record made of worn parts found and conditions that could lead to failure. This could include contaminated lubricant, failed bearings, undersized shaft journals, oversized bearing housings, clogged air passages, and numerous other conditions. Overlubrication, which contributes to increased losses due to friction, should be noted. Bearing sizes and types should be recorded and com pared with nameplate or motor manufacturer specifi cations when available. Incorrect bearing replacement, such as the use of bearings with contact seals instead of non-contact seals or shields, has been found to be a significant cause of increased friction losses.
A report showing mechanics' notes should fol1ow the motor through this process, and the relevant infor mation should be furnished to the end-user. The trade association EASA has created a sample fonn entitled AC 3-PHASE MOTOR SERVICE ORDER that provides an outline for much of this infonnation. Bearing housings and shaft journals may have spe cial fits that the motor manufacturer's engineers deter mined. In the absence of motor manufacturers' data, fits should be measured to ten-thousandths of an inch (or, if metric, hundredths of a millimeter) and compared to values from Tables 2 and 4 of American Bearing Manufacturers Association (ABMA) Standard 7, with the k5 tolerance classification usual1y applicable for shaft journals and the H6 tolerance classification ap plicable for housings of ball bearings. Handy guides derived from these reference standards are available from EASA. Rol1er bearing fits are slightly different, and may be found in the M6 tolerance classification. Shaft runout should be measured, and, once the

motor is disassembled, rotor eccentricity should be de tennined. The rotor runout should not exceed ten per cent of the average air gap length. So, if air gap length has an average value of .060 inches, rotor runout should not exceed .006 inches at any point along its length. A minimum clean-up cut in a lathe, using a tool that doesn't smear the laminations, can be used to bring a rotor into tolerance. Or, if a journal is worn and must be restored, the machinist may be able to bring the ro tor runout within tolerance during restoration of the jour nal. Eddy currents in the rotor laminations at frequen cies other than the fundamental (60 Hz) create losses that are most prevalent in the outer .080 inches (2 mm) of rotor diameter. Care must be taken to avoid reduc ing the effects of the rotor's interlaminar insulation. In general, enlarging the air gap by machining the rotor circumference is not recommended. The effect may be to decrease stray load losses, but to increase core losses. The repairer has no way of knowing whether he's reached the point where the increase in core losses exceeds the decrease in stray load losses. Should the stator laminations be distorted, there is relatively little one can do short of replacing lamina tions or restacking the existing lamination sheets. Grinding lamination teeth in order to restore bore runout likely will increase core losses. Frame and stator yoke distortion may allow excessive vibration. Al1 three-phase induction motors, regardless of the number of poles will exhibit vibration at two times line frequency (or 7200 cycles per minute on 60 Hz power), but keeping the rotor runout within tolerance will help minimize vibration amplitude. Beyond that, the re pairer can do little. The manufacturer's original de sign is critical here. Careful cleaning of the disassembled motor and removing obstructions to a clogged ventilating system will al10w the assembled motor to operate cooler, thus reducing stator and rotor conductor losses. At full load, these are the majority of losses. Dynamic balancing of the rotor to minimize vi bration is always recommended. The energy produc ing vibration is considered wasteful and can lead to premature failure of bearings.

If rewinding is required, the old windings must be removed. The core iron may have been damaged dur ing failure, such as from the coils short-circuiting to

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ground in a slot or from the rotor dragging into the sta tor core due to a failed bearing. Or, the core may have been damaged due to improper repairs from a previous rewind. While core losses (as measured by IEEE 112 Method B) may be approximately 20% of a motor's losses, these losses can double if the interlaminar insu lation is damaged. A loop test (Figure 1), as described in EASA Tech Note No. 17 - Stator Core Testing, may not detect all the damage in the core. Furthermore, extensive research by LTEE, a laboratory operated by Hydro Quebec, con firm that the watts per pound (of core iron) loss as de termined by such a loop test does not have a direct re lationship with the watts per pound loss using the core loss value from a test of the assembled motor using IEEE 112 Method B.

motor repair industry involves roasting the old wind ings and stator core until the resins disintegrate. Here, testing has shown that some electrical steels can be damaged if elevated to 800F (426C) for even short amounts of time (cf. Figure 2).

I Steel A
I Sleel B

I (M36-C3)

1777>7

I Single healing !I

115 hours. OF o 700'F

lZl 800' F
10900' F
1000' F

I (M36-C5)
Steel C (M36-C4) Steel D
(M43-C5)

,
2 4 6 Core Loss (Wllb)

I
8

Figure 2. Effect Of temperature on core loss after first heating. Some types of steel used in motors can be safely raised to 1OOOF (538C) for great lengths of time with no increase in core losses. Other types of steel used in motors have damage from even 800F, and that dam age can be cumulative over time. Thus, repeated re winds are a cause for concern (cf. Figure 3).

tJEnlarged view

Figure 1. Loop test of a stator core. In addition, localized iron damage is not assessed by the loop test's watts per pound measurement. Over exciting the core iron during the loop test may provide evidence of overheating in local areas, which indicates shorted laminations. The stripping process, long suspected as the major source of motor efficiency degradation, usually involves heat cleaning in a roasting oven. Chemical stripping is often ineffective since most electrical varnishes are designed for high bond-strength and are heat and chemi cal resistant. Chemical stripping methods usually are performed at temperatures far below those that dam age interlaminar insulation, but the chemical waste may produce environmental and safety-related issues that are difficult to handle. Some mechanical stripping methods, using only sufficient heat to reduce resin bond strength to a level where a mechanical device can pull out the old coils, are useful in reducing additional dam age from the stripping process. But the most prevalent stripping method in the

(M36-C3) ~ Steel A

~~~~~~~~iiI.~

Steel B (M36-C5)

Repeated heatings each 15 hours, BOOF

Il Initial

I (M36-C4)

Steel C

E:I

1st heating

o 2nd heating
3rd heating

I(M43-C5)
o
1 2 3 4 Core Loss (Wllb)

Steel D

Figure 3. Effect of time on core loss when heating At 800 F. The studies recently performed by LTEE also in cluded studies of the temperature gradients found within the oven and on the stator itself, as the roasting process produces and exothermic reaction. The conclusion from the study indicate that oven controls should allow for at least a 100F safety margin. EASA guidelines (Tech Note No. 16-Guidelines for Maintaining Motor Effi ciency During Rebuilding) suggest that the oven set point of 650F be used, with temperature measured on

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the stator core. A skilled technician should also measure coil ex tensions and shaping, and note the winding pattern of the old winding. The goal is to provide a winding equal to the original winding, thus maintaining efficiency. Some manufacturers will provide some of this infor mation upon request. but it generally is only available for motor ratings in current production. And, the infor mation may be unsuitable for the repairer to use. End-users often say to repair to "original specifi cations." He may feel there is a ready source of wind ing data, resistance values, wire size, etc., available. To the repair firm, that information is usually non-ex istent or difficult to obtain. Repairing to "original speci fications" means reverse-engineering. Efforts are un derway to streamline the flow of factory data. but this process is very slow. Once the old winding is removed from the core, the technician should perform a second core loop test to determine suitability of the laminations. If the core has sustained some damage, then repairs should be made. The winding design should be checked against data bases collected by the service center as well as by the motor repair industry trade association, EASA, whose database has more than 282,000 AC motor winding records. If practical, factory data should be obtained. (Copying an incorrect winding design from a previous rewind surely is undesirable.) Magnetic flux densities can be calculated, and these should fall within a rather broad range of acceptable values. Unfortunately, these will help to prevent making gross errors, but are little help in maintaining efficiency to acceptable levels. where very slight winding changes make significant efficiency changes. When specifying a motor rewind, the end-user should request that the current density of the new wind ing be no greater than the current density of the origi nal winding. If winding and connection patterns are the same, that means specifying that the conductor cross-sectional area not be reduced. And, if original windings have aluminum conductors, these should be replaced with copper conductors. If the repairer fol lows these provisions, then the repaired motor "copper losses," or stator FR losses, should not increase.

ing a coating that resists the fatigue failure from the application of high peak voltages that come from VFD power supplies. (Working closely with the repair firms to be used allows the repairer to inventory the neces sary materials.) Voids in the insulation should be avoided by impregnation methods and materials that fill these voids with solid insulation (for example, vacuum impregnation with 100% solids resins), since voids will be the sites where magnet wire degradation occurs from partial discharge or corona. Various tests should be performed to determine tum-to-turn integrity and winding insulation resistance to ground. While these do not directly relate to motor efficiency, they are essential to quality assurance. Im pregnation of the windings with an insulating varnish is necessary to bond the wires to each other, minimiz ing mechanical wear-and-tear on the windings. These resins may also provide a thermal conductor to help remove heat from the windings in the stator core, where the motor temperature is usually the greatest. Effects of the resin impregnation system on motor efficiency have not been studied closely. Induction motors have a cage winding in the rotor which may be made of copper bars and endrings, alu minum bars and endrings, or various specialty alloys. While the rotor is seldom damaged during a motor fail ure, the rotor cage should be checked for open bars. If these conductors are damaged, then repairs must be performed to carefully maintain the resistance charac teristics of the rotor. This is done not only to maintain rotor FR losses, but to retain the torque and starting current characteristics. Finally, assembly of the machine should include tests to verify that vibration levels fall within accept able levels. EASA Standards for the Repair of Electri cal Apparatus (Accepted February 1995) describe vi bration tests for standard machines operated on sinu soidal power at full-rated voltage under no-load. CONCLUSION In studies performed by British Columbia Hydro, Hydro Quebec, Ontario Hydro, and Industrial Electrotechnology Laboratory at North Carolina State University, the average decrease of full-load effi ciency was approximately half of one percentage point. They concluded that quality assurance with conventional practices and equipment can maintain original design efficiency.

If the motor is to be used on a variable frequency drive, this might be an excellent opportunity for the repairer to upgrade the winding with magnet wire hav
Proceedings from the Nineteenth Industrial Energy Technology Conference, Houston, TX, April 23-24, 1997

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