4 ms·
I've had some major frustrations with poor reliability of the blower motor in a 14 SEER HVAC system (installed in 2006) with a brushless DC motor. I've replaced
by EvanAnderson 9y ago
I've had some major frustrations with poor reliability of the blower motor in a 14 SEER HVAC system (installed in 2006) with a brushless DC motor. I've replaced the motor 3 times in 10 years (conveniently failing shortly after the warranty expired each time). Had I not done the work myself that would have been between $600 and $800 per replacement.
Brushless / electronically commutated DC motors are pretty interesting, though: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brushless_DC_electric_motor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brushless_DC_electric_motor
- mjfern 9y agoWho's the manufacturer?
- EvanAnderson 9y agoThe air handler is a Bryant. The motors have been a General Electric X13 (the original patent-holder for the X13 electronically commutated constant-torque PWM motor controller), a Regal Beloit "Evergreen" X13 OEM replacement, and now a Nidec X13 motor. These motors are microcontroller-based. Apparently there was a rash of bad GE X13 motors in the early 2000's traced to bad thermistors. Unfortunately the board is potted in an insulating compound that makes board-level repair rather impractical. My first motor's controller failed after about 8 years. It was cheaper to just buy a new motor vs. replacing only the controller. The second motor's rotor started grinding against the stator after about 13 months. I pulled the controller from that motor and installed it on the first motor (since it was near-perfect duplicate of the original motor). That ran for 14 months before the second controller failed. I've been running the third (Nidec) motor for about 2 months. I'll be interested to see how to holds up long-term.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]