When I first got my FP1, I had one hell of a time unloading it from a trailer with a good part of the difficulty coming from the fact that the electrical box was connected to the mill via two non-disconnectable cable conduits. Indeed, it was possible to disconnect the wires from the terminal block inside but I endeavored to muscle the two pieces around without doing that. This mill is 1967ish and throughout its life the conduit was stretched and the internal wires were showing through very clearly. I vowed that sometime during my ownership of the mill that I would devise a way to decouple this box to make transport easier. Well, after several weeks of slow-roll assembling parts, I finally embarked on this task and it’s coming together nicely albeit not done. The smoke test is soon but I thought I’d share the mechanics (or electrics) with y’all.
The connectors are high quality DMS plugs and sockets, Wiring came from cannibalizing some 12-3 and 12-4 SJ cable (a lot of same and unconventional wire colors but all are marked and labeled and recorded). Cable sheathing is just some expandable audio cable sheathing I got from Amazon. The four red wires from the mill body were cut and butt-spliced to new wires ending in the new 4-pin plug. The motor wiring was straightforward and that cable ended in a 7-pin plug. Now I can transport the damn thing without dragging an electrical box "pig" along with it. I know some folks have adapted a VFD to their machines but I wanted to keep this electrical box around; as dirty as it is.
I also used the original conduit "ends" even though they are sized and threaded to an old standard. The flexibility of the sheathing I used enabled that. The old conduit had a nominal amount of stretch resistance and my new sheathing has none but I intend to unplug the cables to avoid any stretching and wire stress.
(sorry if these pictures come out too small - I don't know the trick to make them bigger.
Cheers,
Rich
The connectors are high quality DMS plugs and sockets, Wiring came from cannibalizing some 12-3 and 12-4 SJ cable (a lot of same and unconventional wire colors but all are marked and labeled and recorded). Cable sheathing is just some expandable audio cable sheathing I got from Amazon. The four red wires from the mill body were cut and butt-spliced to new wires ending in the new 4-pin plug. The motor wiring was straightforward and that cable ended in a 7-pin plug. Now I can transport the damn thing without dragging an electrical box "pig" along with it. I know some folks have adapted a VFD to their machines but I wanted to keep this electrical box around; as dirty as it is.
I also used the original conduit "ends" even though they are sized and threaded to an old standard. The flexibility of the sheathing I used enabled that. The old conduit had a nominal amount of stretch resistance and my new sheathing has none but I intend to unplug the cables to avoid any stretching and wire stress.
(sorry if these pictures come out too small - I don't know the trick to make them bigger.
Cheers,
Rich