Car Lift overloads required?

G

gulf0927

Member
Location
Lehigh Valley, PA
Wiring a car lift for a small used car shop. Odd size motor, 2.5 HP, 13 FLA 230V single phase. Not thermally protected. Can't find any overload/starters that match this range, and am hesitant to start rigging 3 phase starters for single phase, as I hear often mixed success with this. I was thinking of having the breaker be used as overload protection because it is intermittent duty and used sparingly. Disconnect switch would be mounted on the wall next to the lift, then piped over.

The service guy I called at Mohawk says most guys just run plug and cord. To be honest, everyone just wires these things cheap as possible, but I'm not going to violate the code for convenience. Just wondering if anyone else has experience wiring lifts before and if 430.33 lets me use the breaker as the overload.
 
I been down this road. I am sure there are some well trained installers but they brought a 4 pole twisty to mine and I had to use it right there or they were gonna have a fit and its really because they dont understand disconnect rules and having a plug makes them feel good. As I recall,,, this motor, it is manual operated but/and has limited duty cycle which provides the thermal.
If you were to wire it to a legal switch and hard wire can use 14 wire with 30 ocpd. If it used a standard outlet would have to match conductor size.
 
My breaker is 19 ft away right in front. I did leave handi box for 2 pole switch. Its mine so I ran 10 I had on hand, mightHoist wiring.JPG 12 for a customer, might add 6/50 outlet to it,,,, hahahaha.
 
You can build a starter out of a 2 pole contactor. Just make sure the coil voltage is 240. Connect the output of the contactor to the coil and loop in a pushbutton NO for start, NC for stop. The motor safety idea is if there is a power cut out in the building, the motor cannot restart. The breaker can be the disconnect if the panel is in "line of sight".
 
herding_cats said:
You can build a starter out of a 2 pole contactor. Just make sure the coil voltage is 240. Connect the output of the contactor to the coil and loop in a pushbutton NO for start, NC for stop. The motor safety idea is if there is a power cut out in the building, the motor cannot restart. The breaker can be the disconnect if the panel is in "line of sight".
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Doesn't get you thermal overload though.
 
To be honest, the operater has to be holding down the button to make the lift operate. I may just install a fused disconnect with dual element time delays on the post, above the motor for overload + disconnect requirements. HP rated of course. Then a short piece of flex to the motor box. A magnetic starter seems like overkill.
 
would you happen to have a picture of nameplate on the motor?

i would be surprised to see a 1HP+ single phase motor not have a built-in overload or internal thermal protection.

but with some of the cheap, chinese stuff coming across on the boat, it's possible....
 
Master Nater said:
would you happen to have a picture of nameplate on the motor?

i would be surprised to see a 1HP+ single phase motor not have a built-in overload or internal thermal protection.

but with some of the cheap, chinese stuff coming across on the boat, it's possible....
Click to expand...
I don't have a picture. To be honest I've searched a ton, but so many companies never list nameplate info online, which is what electricians need before install. I called the service department and the technician read the nameplate to me. Said no thermal protection.

I agree, it's ridiculous. So many companies cheaping oit as much as possible.
 
This application doesn't even require motor overload protection. Every one I ever seen was a intermittent duty rated motor. By nature of the operation they are an intermittent load anyway they all have a momentary contact button and you must hold to run the motor. They don't run long enough cycle to even trip normal motor overload protectors. If motor stalls or fails to start for some reason you are right there to let up on switch and if you don't it will trip your short circuit/ground fault protection within a few seconds anyway.

Check this section out:
1773370117812.png
 
Eddie702 said:
Not sure if 2 pole starters are available or ever were. Very common to use a 3 pole starter for single phase. They tell you to use the two outside poles L1 & L3
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Decades ago 1 and 2 pole single phase starters were common.
As IEC style overloads relays became more prevalent dedicated single phase starters became less common. These overloads contain a phase loss sensitivity feature that requires current flow through all three elements.

The easiest way to use 3 phase starters on single phase is to employee jumpers like this:
1 pole arrangement
Hot - L1,
T1 - jump to T2
L2 - jump to L3
T3 - Motor
Or
2 pole arrangement
Hot 1 - L1
T1 - Motor 1
Hot 2 - L2
T2 - jumper to L3
T3 - Motor 2
 
Never saw one that needed a Motor Starter.
The momentary pushbutton to start the hydraulic motor is on the side of the pecker head to raise the car.
The lever releases the hydraulics to lower the car.
Usually a head bar over the top with a N/C contact that you series the power through so it stops the motor should the car get too high.

All simple stuff.

Jap>
 
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