First, I did search the group and did not find the specific info I
need. I was given an older Maytag 1/3 hp 1725 rpm washing machine
motor and need help with the wiring to retask it for other use.
The wiring block on the end of the motor is set up with six connectors,
4 ganged with 1 internal and 1 external wire, 2 with single wires. It
looks as follows, (E) indicates external wire connected to house
current (115v) / maybe a capacitor? the other color is internal
wiring:

1 Blue / Red (E) 2 Green (E)

3 Black 4 Yellow / White (E)

5 Red / Yellow (E) 6 Orange / Black (E)

2 is connected to 3 via the centrifugal switch, I disassembled it to
verify. Obviously the start winding. This shows a resistance of .4,
probably need to clean my meters connections. Other values follow.
1 - 4 2 ohms
1 - 6 2 ohms
2 - 3 .4 ohm
3 - 5 3.6 ohms
4 - 6 .4 ohm
Any assistance in wiring / testing this would be appreciated. TIA

"PatD" wrote in message
oups.com...
First, I did search the group and did not find the specific info I
need. I was given an older Maytag 1/3 hp 1725 rpm washing machine
motor and need help with the wiring to retask it for other use.
The wiring block on the end of the motor is set up with six connectors,
4 ganged with 1 internal and 1 external wire, 2 with single wires. It
looks as follows, (E) indicates external wire connected to house
current (115v) / maybe a capacitor? the other color is internal
wiring:

1 Blue / Red (E) 2 Green (E)

3 Black 4 Yellow / White (E)

5 Red / Yellow (E) 6 Orange / Black (E)

2 is connected to 3 via the centrifugal switch, I disassembled it to
verify. Obviously the start winding. This shows a resistance of .4,
probably need to clean my meters connections. Other values follow.
1 - 4 2 ohms
1 - 6 2 ohms
2 - 3 .4 ohm
3 - 5 3.6 ohms
4 - 6 .4 ohm
Any assistance in wiring / testing this would be appreciated. TIA

I thought all washing machine motors were DC as its easier to reverse and
speed control

Mr Fixit wrote:
"PatD" wrote in message
oups.com...

First, I did search the group and did not find the specific info I
need. I was given an older Maytag 1/3 hp 1725 rpm washing machine
motor and need help with the wiring to retask it for other use.
The wiring block on the end of the motor is set up with six connectors,
4 ganged with 1 internal and 1 external wire, 2 with single wires. It
looks as follows, (E) indicates external wire connected to house
current (115v) / maybe a capacitor? the other color is internal
wiring:

1 Blue / Red (E) 2 Green (E)

3 Black 4 Yellow / White (E)

5 Red / Yellow (E) 6 Orange / Black (E)

2 is connected to 3 via the centrifugal switch, I disassembled it to
verify. Obviously the start winding. This shows a resistance of .4,
probably need to clean my meters connections. Other values follow.
1 - 4 2 ohms
1 - 6 2 ohms
2 - 3 .4 ohm
3 - 5 3.6 ohms
4 - 6 .4 ohm
Any assistance in wiring / testing this would be appreciated. TIA


I thought all washing machine motors were DC as its easier to reverse and
speed control




Standard north american washing machines have used AC induction motors
since the beginning, they're often two speed, non reversible and use a
mechanical transmission to drive the oscillating agitator and spin
cycle. The last few years European-style front loaders with series wound
universal or polyphase VFD driven induction motors are becoming much
more popular but the old fashioned induction motor powered top loader is
still in probably 95% of homes.

"James Sweet" wrote in message
news:2mVHf.55406$_D1.3670@trnddc03...
Mr Fixit wrote:
"PatD" wrote in message
oups.com...

First, I did search the group and did not find the specific info I
need. I was given an older Maytag 1/3 hp 1725 rpm washing machine
motor and need help with the wiring to retask it for other use.
The wiring block on the end of the motor is set up with six connectors,
4 ganged with 1 internal and 1 external wire, 2 with single wires. It
looks as follows, (E) indicates external wire connected to house
current (115v) / maybe a capacitor? the other color is internal
wiring:

1 Blue / Red (E) 2 Green (E)

3 Black 4 Yellow / White (E)

5 Red / Yellow (E) 6 Orange / Black (E)

2 is connected to 3 via the centrifugal switch, I disassembled it to
verify. Obviously the start winding. This shows a resistance of .4,
probably need to clean my meters connections. Other values follow.
1 - 4 2 ohms
1 - 6 2 ohms
2 - 3 .4 ohm
3 - 5 3.6 ohms
4 - 6 .4 ohm
Any assistance in wiring / testing this would be appreciated. TIA


I thought all washing machine motors were DC as its easier to reverse and
speed control


Standard north american washing machines have used AC induction motors
since the beginning, they're often two speed, non reversible and use a
mechanical transmission to drive the oscillating agitator and spin cycle.
The last few years European-style front loaders with series wound
universal or polyphase VFD driven induction motors are becoming much more
popular but the old fashioned induction motor powered top loader is still
in probably 95% of homes.

I live and learn I never have lived in America just assumed they were
similar the the UK ones

Standard north american washing machines have used AC induction motors
since the beginning, they're often two speed, non reversible and use a
mechanical transmission to drive the oscillating agitator and spin cycle.
The last few years European-style front loaders with series wound
universal or polyphase VFD driven induction motors are becoming much more
popular but the old fashioned induction motor powered top loader is still
in probably 95% of homes.

I live and learn I never have lived in America just assumed they were
similar the the UK ones




It's surprising just how different they are, just recently acquired a
Creda front load washer which as far as I know is a very typical UK unit
but it was completely new to me and took some exploring to understand
how it worked well enough to fix it. I also picked up and fixed a Maytag
Neptune which is a high end American made front loader which performs
very well compared to the top loaders I've always had. I like the design
of the Creda a bit better but it has a much smaller capacity, probably
about half. The Neptune is one of those which uses a 3 phase induction
motor with an electronic variable frequency drive, pretty cool stuff.

James,

I bought a Neptune washer model MAH5500BWW in 2001. It has been working
until this Monday. The motor does not spin at all. BTW, I totally
missed out on the class action lawsuit since I hadn't had any problems
with the washer. An of course, I don't have the warranty anymore.

So I opened the main control board cover and found a wiring diagram and
some diagnostic test instructions. I ran the test and traced it down to
the motor control board (located at the lower right bottom from the
front panel), and a 10Amp fuse was blown. The instructions states that
"If the motor does not run: Check the 10 amp fuse located on the
control board, either visually or with an ohm meter. If bad, replace
motor control/wire harness assembly completely." I checked the maytag
website and the part costs $174.99 + tax + shipping. After reading all
the problems with the neptune washer on the net, I am not sure if I
want to reinvest about $200 on this thing, which may fail with other
problems sooner or later.

With my understanding in electricals, a fuse is supposed to the protect
the circuitry. So why in the world do you need to replace the entire
assembly if just the fuse is blown. I went to the radio shack and
bought a 10 amp fuse, soldered it in, ran the test again, same failure.

With your experience in fixing a neptune, can you shed some light or
give me any suggestions. I'd be much appreciated.

Best Regards,
PB

wrote:
James,

I bought a Neptune washer model MAH5500BWW in 2001. It has been working
until this Monday. The motor does not spin at all. BTW, I totally
missed out on the class action lawsuit since I hadn't had any problems
with the washer. An of course, I don't have the warranty anymore.

So I opened the main control board cover and found a wiring diagram and
some diagnostic test instructions. I ran the test and traced it down to
the motor control board (located at the lower right bottom from the
front panel), and a 10Amp fuse was blown. The instructions states that
"If the motor does not run: Check the 10 amp fuse located on the
control board, either visually or with an ohm meter. If bad, replace
motor control/wire harness assembly completely." I checked the maytag
website and the part costs $174.99 + tax + shipping. After reading all
the problems with the neptune washer on the net, I am not sure if I
want to reinvest about $200 on this thing, which may fail with other
problems sooner or later.

With my understanding in electricals, a fuse is supposed to the protect
the circuitry. So why in the world do you need to replace the entire
assembly if just the fuse is blown. I went to the radio shack and
bought a 10 amp fuse, soldered it in, ran the test again, same failure.

With your experience in fixing a neptune, can you shed some light or
give me any suggestions. I'd be much appreciated.

Best Regards,
PB



Well so far I've picked up two Neptunes, both with the exact symptoms
you describe. The first one I was lucky and the fuse was not blown on
the motor board and resoldering a bunch of cracked joints got it up and
running.

The next one the fuse was also not blown, but several of the MOSFETs,
and a couple of the driver chips had craters blown in them. I replaced
those parts and then discovered that the large custom chip was also
fried so I ended up replacing the motor board, got lucky and a friend
had an extra one through a screwup of the warranty service on his but
you can order them from repairclinic.com.

You can try replacing any shorted mosfets and driver IC's and you may
get lucky, or you may find that the control chip is fried. It's
unfortunate that they didn't incorporate any sort of isolation or
protection so if a mosfet shorts then high voltage can trace right back
into the low voltage logic. The fuse blows to prevent anything from
catching fire, but logic chips can be fried an order of magnitude
quicker. What I would do is remove any shorted mosfets and their
respective driver chips, then apply power and check for 5V across the
power and ground pins on the control chip. In my fried one it was
holding the voltage down to around 1V. You could also check for signs of
life from the outputs of the chip, a scope will help here but be sure
you power the board from an isolation transformer if you try that.

Thanks James for lots of useful info.

I further inspected the board and found out that Q5, R34, and R35 are
blown. I didn't notice these before. They may have been fried after I
installed the fuse. For Q5, I am planning to find one from radio shack.
But, I need the resistance values on R34 and R35. Would you by any
chance have this numbers?

Thanks,
PB

I found more fried parts: Q5, R34 and R35. Do you have any info on the
resistance values of R34 and R35?

Thanks,
PB

P Boy wrote:
Thanks James for lots of useful info.

I further inspected the board and found out that Q5, R34, and R35 are
blown. I didn't notice these before. They may have been fried after I
installed the fuse. For Q5, I am planning to find one from radio shack.
But, I need the resistance values on R34 and R35. Would you by any
chance have this numbers?

Thanks,
PB



You probably won't find Q5 at Radio Shack, it's a high voltage N-channel
power MOSFET, digikey sells the P16NK60Z which will work though. Make
sure you test the rest, often they will short without visibly blowing
up. On mine one of the big diodes was also shorted, as were a few
smaller ones and most of the IR2101 IC's were shorted.

R34 and R35 are 75 ohm. Make sure you check IC8 because it's a custom
chip, if that chip is bad then replacing any other parts is a waste of
time because you can't get a new IC8. If that does appear to be OK then
you'll have to at minimum have a multimeter to test for shorted diodes
and transistors, if you miss one shorted part it could very well blow up
all the new parts you installed in the blink of an eye. It's just the
way it is with power electronics.

In most cases, the purpose of a large fuse would be to prevent
a fire, not to protect the electronic components.

wrote:

With my understanding in electricals, a fuse is supposed to the protect
the circuitry. So why in the world do you need to replace the entire
assembly if just the fuse is blown. I went to the radio shack and
bought a 10 amp fuse, soldered it in, ran the test again, same failure.

Here's a pic I took earlier showing the original motor control board on
the right, then on the left is the replacement board along with the
strange bucket it mounts in. As you can see, it was completely redesigned.

http://sparcbox.hopto.org/pics/neptune_boards.jpg