Recent content by bramdam

We manufacture heaters. Simple heaters that are designed for a specific voltage, for a specific wattage, thus a fixed resistance and the corresponding amperage. However, sales guys preach that it is OK to hook up the heater to a lower voltage without damaging it. They claim the voltage is lower...

No house or business wiring...These circuits are used in industrial heaters. Composed of NiCr resistance wires, Mica, and then the standard TGGT or MGT wire sized to handle the load of the heater-which is based on the wattage of the heater.

I am looking for the rule of thumb when selecting a wire gage for ground wires on electrical circuits. Currently we use 18 GA for all of circuitry regardless of the amperage of the circuit-from less than 1A to over 30A we use 18 GA. We have never had an issue but I am wondering why 18 GA was...

I will try and dig up the schematic. I do not know the parameters of the wye heater, only the delta heater. But here is the email for which I do not agree. I do believe we undersized a power cable thus leading to the start of all this for we did not account for the line amperage being higher...

I manufacture heating elements and a customer wired a delta heater in parallel with a wye heater. They claim that this lowers the overall resistance of the delta thus causing this element to draw more amps than what it was designed for. I disagree and do not see how the heater is eternally...

Jim, I laid out four options to resolve this issue and they chose to re-evaluate their hi-pot testing procedure. In the meantime they will tie the leads of our heater together, after the contactor, to avoid presenting a voltage differential across it. I could not get one to fail testing it...

Sorry I am late to this. You have found the heater and it is after the auxiliary contactor, either C1AUX or C2AUX, not sure which one is our heater. My guess is the heater is after the NO contact for what I have been told there is a selector switch that allows the heater to be turned on or...

Testing Procedure I think we are onto something. Below is the testing procedures and I see the very likelihood that the diode is experiencing the differential not once, but multiple times during this testing. Looking forward to your feedback. Testing Procedure: Attached is the schematic...

Thanks Jim. This is UL product and changing anything on it would come with agony. However, it is not impossible. If we were to recommend or incorporate a surge protector how would we hook it up. The diode is integrated in series into a lead and inaccessible. Putting this surge device in...

To the best of my knowledge that is the reason. This is more of a warming element than heating.

I have shot them some questions and will keep you posted. Thanks again for the help.

The unit is a 480V unit and our heater is either a 240 or a 120 depending on the style called for. Are you asking if the heater is powered up? They state that there is an auxiliary contact that needs to be closed for the heater to turn on. What if it is not closed during the hi-pot test...

Sorry, print says it is hooked up to L2 and L3. But only two legs.

The heater is wired to L1 and L2 after some fuses. The diode is either in L1 or L2 since there is only one in the heater and I am sure they do not know which lead contains the diode for it is encased. The only thing they explained was that the hi-pot test is hooked into L1, L2, and L3. They...

Schematics This is what they gave me.