Temporary Motor Hook Ups

Hi all,

Where I work, we make a lot of hydraulic power units with three phase motors. We test each of these and so are constantly hooking up motors on a temporary basis. We are in the process of upgrading our testing area to provide more ease of use and better protection for these temporary electrical hook ups.

I'm wondering if anyone else is in this situation and if so, do you have any methods or practices to share regarding what you like or don't like in your set ups.

One think we have in our system that we will be carrying over to the new system is a built in Hi-Pot tester/interlock on each motor starter from Meg-Alert. We occasionally do re-work of older equipment and after finding a couple bad motors the hard way, installed these.

Ideally, I could have 4 or 5 hook ups with programmable outlet ports for different motor horsepowers.

Make a clamp that fits over the boltcap, so you do not need to tighten the bolts every time.
First use the megger to check the motor.
Then start a nice big VFD, you can control the max current very easily on the keyboard.
If too high it will stop unit, without damage.
You can even make a graph how much current is drawn under load etc.

We use terminal blocks on DIN rail and keep a locked local disconnect for each voltage we use. This way the current is physically covered up and locked out with a shop gang lock when not in use. Do this with your VFD's too. Run all the wiring to terminal blocks so that all you have to do is hook 3 wires up to terminal blocks and hit a switch/disconnect to see the motor under load.