So the main electrical power connection for the rope machine were mounted to a piece of sheet metal under the control panel. There wasn’t any effort made to prevent electrical shock or short circuit such as a proper electrical enclosure. So I purchased an 8″ x 8″ x 4″ electrical junction box to put the 220v breaker and relay inside of.
I modified the box and added a stand-off so the breaker switch could be flipped without taking the cover off. Since I had to disconnect the wires so I could route them into to box I decided to use properly color coded wire and run the ground wires to the .other controller. The factory just used red wire for everything and didn’t provide for a ground wire…
Here are some before and after photos.
I’ll probably paint a rectangle on the cover around the breaker with labels for on and off. This box looks a lot cleaner and I can reach down to flip the breaker on and off without worrying that I’ll be electrocuted if I accidentally touch one or more of the power connections.
it seems that transporting the container from the rail yard to the workshop isn’t an easy or straightforward task. To begin with you really only have one option for having the container picked up at the rail yard. Next, that company will only take the container to a commercial address. Third, you gotta have a way to unload the machine and transport the contents to the workshop. Fourth, every day you don’t get this accomplished costs hundreds of dollars.
Rope machine out of the container and on the truck headed to the workshop.
Me and my machine!
Tow truck driver managed to get the machine most of the way into the workshop.
The rope machine takes up most of the space in the workshop.
The machine in its new home.
Setup
So just to get the machine fully into the workshop I had to lift it and set it on 6 furniture dollies then still had to us a 5′ pry bar to slowly nudge it into place.
Next step is to connect the power. This sounds easy enough but it’s pretty complicated. The workshop doesn’t have the right power requirements so I need to use a large generator and a converter to change to power into the kind the rope machine can use. I decided to mount the converter to the machine. The converter comes as two parts; the control panel and the idler motor. The panel will be mounted on the large cage near the machine controls and the idler motor will be mounted on the other side near the floor.
Phase converter control panel mounting area.
Today I was able to add mounting brackets, attach the control panel to the cage, run the 50 amp and 30 amp power cords to the control panel and to the machine as well as run the line for the idler motor, and wire the control panel.
Phase converter mounted using new brackets
Mounted phase converter control panel with cover on.
Phase converter control panel with power cables ready to wire.
Phase converter control panel fully wired.
Closeup of phase converter control panel showing wiring and installed circuit breaker.
Wired phase converter control panel with cover on and power cords running to the generator, idler motor position, and rope machine power input.
Next, I need to mark the power connections with appropriately colored electrical tape, bundle wires together with zip ties, terminate the unused neutral wire from the generator, attach cable clamps to secure the cords to the frame of the machine, move the open power connections on the rope machine into an electrical junction box, mount the idler motor to the machine frame, and wire the idler motor.
3 phase, 240V circuit breaker and relay for the rope machine without any enclosure.
3 phase 240V circuit breaker
3 phase power relay that connects to start, stop, and safety switches.
Bought some jute twine to run through the machine to learn how it works…
So the thing about shipping containers is that it for every thing they makes easier to ship goods there’s also a drawback. Common benefits are the ability to load the container in one country and have ships, trains, and trucks be able to move it without the need for the contents to be removed and loaded into the next conveyance before continuing on.
The apparent problem with using shipping containers is that it’s really difficult for the average guy to deal with them unless you have a warehouse with a dock available to you. When I researched the process of receiving a shipping container it was clear that it was much better and cheaper to arrange the trucking of the container from the yard to your facility on your own because pretty much any entity you deal with is going to charge a fee to higher a trucking company. More than once I saw it recommended that the container be shipped from container yard to container yard instead of warehouse to warehouse.
So that’s what I chose to do. But it seems that you have to find the right trucking company because the company has to be UIIA compliant. What’s that? Unofficially it’s a way to make sure only certain companies can move a container.
I didn’t realize that the customs process wasn’t included in the very expensive shipping charges so that’s my fault. If it had been done then Monday I could have started trying to get the container moved to the workshop. Instead I was already paying storage fees to the container yard before I could even try to move the container. I called a company that can move the container but they would do it because the delivery address is residential. How do you expect me to get the container in that case? The recommended a few companies that could deliver to a residential address. So I called and scheduled a truck to pick up the container at 9am the following day. This way if there was any problems I had the rest of the day to fix it. Well the company lost my appointment the managed to put me off all day until it was too late to get the container out of the yard, unloaded at the workshop, and returned to the yard before it was closed. I knew there was a possibility that the yard wouldn’t let the driver in without the UIIA stuff but I figured it was worth the gamble and left the rest of the day to find a workaround. BTW, the towing companies are the cheapest method for this process…
So I’m going to use the address of a commercial property I looked at leasing that’s actually only a couple miles from the workshop and have the trucking company and the flatbed driver meet me there. Then the flatbed can transport the machine to the workshop for me. Would have been nice if I could have initiated that plan 5 days ago.
Can’t do anything until Monday so think I’ll relax tomorrow.
