Does anyone here know?
Happily I don't need one, but I was wondering what the damage would be if I did.
Happily I don't need one, but I was wondering what the damage would be if I did.
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Price of controller for PM3520?
- Thread starter KEW
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It depends a lot on what you want. Retail new from Powermatic might be as much as $400. If you are familiar with the market, you can probably save quite a bit by dealing directly through a distributor. And, if you don't mind getting a different, but compatible drive, you can save even more, perhaps getting one for less than $200. You can frequently get a used one of much higher quality than the original for less than $100 on the Industrial section of eBay, but you must be thoroughly familiar with drives in order to do this because the sellers often don't know enough to answer your questions.
john lucas
AAW Forum Expert
I've been keeping an eye on the market somewhat. You can get them on 3bay occasionally for $100 (although I lost out on two bids that went for $125) www.dealerselectric.com has them for varying prices from about $200 on up. My problem is I don't know enough about how to buy exactly the one needed for a certain motor. I've installed 3 of them for friends. 2 worked perfectly and the 3rd he had to take to a motor repair place to get it working correctly. I lost track of him and couldn't find out what the motor place did differently than me.
I assume if you went to a motor repair place that it would probably be less expensive than Powermatic and they would know exactly what VFD to sell you.
I assume if you went to a motor repair place that it would probably be less expensive than Powermatic and they would know exactly what VFD to sell you.
I know a guy who had to have one replaced on his 16" VS Delta. It was under warranty but if he had to pay for it the cost would have been about $500. The controller is of similar quality to the Powermatic.
About two years ago the controller on my 1997 vintage General 260 died. Since the controller wasn't being made anymore a replacement unit or repair of mine was going to cost about $600. That was not going to happen.
A little research turned up a Hitachi controller from DrivesWarehoues for $180 plus shipping.
It took an afternoon to install the new controller and get it tuned to run with my lathe. It works very well and is every bit as responsive as the original controller but it took a fair understanding of the wiring and a lot reading to do the tuning. Not something for the casual person with limited experience in reading schematics.
One of my pet gripes with the way most lathe controllers are wired is that they are under constant power even when the power switch is off. Since none of us use our lathes for than a few hours a week why leave the power on all the time and cook the electronics. Dumb, dumb and dumb if you ask me. I now unplug mine when I'm not using it.
Ron
A little research turned up a Hitachi controller from DrivesWarehoues for $180 plus shipping.
It took an afternoon to install the new controller and get it tuned to run with my lathe. It works very well and is every bit as responsive as the original controller but it took a fair understanding of the wiring and a lot reading to do the tuning. Not something for the casual person with limited experience in reading schematics.
One of my pet gripes with the way most lathe controllers are wired is that they are under constant power even when the power switch is off. Since none of us use our lathes for than a few hours a week why leave the power on all the time and cook the electronics. Dumb, dumb and dumb if you ask me. I now unplug mine when I'm not using it.
Ron
Mine fried after about 6 months. Scared the heck out of the three of us when it blew - sounded like a gun shot. Powermatic was quick to replace it under warrentee. The only bad part was the manual for the new controller was completely in Korean, not one word of English. Been working great for over six years now.