On Fri, 6 Jan 2006 07:30:58 +0000 (UTC), Christopher Tidy
wrote:

Don Foreman wrote:

snip

My RPC has no capacitors, starts and plug-reverses my lathe and mill
just fine.

Out of interest, what are the horsepower ratings of your RPC idler and
lathe and mill main motors?

Chris

Idler is 5 HP. Lathe is 3 or 5 HP, mill is 1 HP. My idler runs
the lathe just fine when the lathe is set to the 3HP setting, but
can't quite hack it on the 5 HP setting. If I needed the higher
speeds (2x) of the 5 HP setting, I'd probably need a bit larger
idler.

It might pull it if it were a belt-drive lathe or had a clutch, but
it's a gearhead lathe. It tries to work on the 5 HP setting, but it
blows the breaker in the lathe before it can get wound up to speed.

Adding some capacitors probably would help some, but I think a bigger
idler would be the best solution. I'm content to use it as is. 1000
RPM is fast enough to do everything I want to do on that lathe.

The 1 HP mill has no problem operating at any speed. Smaller motor,
less inertia.