Singel phase jointer and single phase feeder

[Mike Heidrick]

I have a question about powering a "shaper" and a 1hp power stock feeder. Both will be single phase 220. Anyway I can adapt the LVC to power both the shaper and feeder at the same time and still use seperate power buttons? Or am I going to need two seperate circuits to power each? Is there a trick to making this easier?

Forgive me guys - I had jointer on the brain when I typed this. I meant to say shaper.

Thinking I will split off before the LVC contactor and install an outlet at the shaper. This way I can unplug and the feeder when needed.

[Paul Johnstone]

Do you have the tools to see the amps they pull. Maybe they could both be run off a 30 A 220 V circuit.

However, I'm pretty sure that code requires things running off 220V to be ran on seperate circuits, and it's a good idea. If you have room in your breaker box, it's not that hard to run a new circuit. That's what I'd advise.

[Ryan Myers]

You can easily do this as long as your continous AMP draw is no more than 80% of your total overcurrent capacity. Like Paul mentioned you need to combine the AMP capacity of both items. It is usually a good idea to make sure your wire is at least rated 125% bigger than total load, because when a motor starts up the inrush current can be many times that of what it normally draws. A true 1hp motor @ 240V should draw around 8.0 amp. If your jointer is 2 HP or less you would be @ 20 amp total for the two items So a 30 amp circuit (10 guage wire) would handle this for you. That is, as long it is no more than 100 feet from your panel, then you would want to step up to the next size wire to accomodate voltage drop.

There is nothing in the code that says you can't have more than one outlet for 240V circuits. It all falls back on load calculations. In certain instances I will install mupltiple receptacles sharing one circuit to conserve breaker space, especially when the items don't draw much to begin with. Otherwise if you have dedicated breaker for every 240V circuit it can eat your valuable panel space in a hurry.

Feel free to PM me if you need any help determining wire size or caclulating the loads.

[Ted Miller]

Ryan, I would think if you power up the jointer then the feeder lock rotor would not trip the single 30 amp breaker. I also run many 30 am receps on one main line with #10s to save space in the gear but I do not run two machines on 220v at once...

[Rod Sheridan]

The only problem with a 30 ampere feed to the jointer and stock feeder, is that the receptacles, cord caps and cords need to be 30 amperes as well.

I like to have seperate control over the machine and the stock feeder, so I don't use the machine starter to run the feeder.

Regards, Rod.

P.S. I'm curious as to how you mounted the feeder on the jointer.

[Ted Miller]

After reading Rod's post then Mike's post again, sure you will have to run two seperate SO cords to two seperate 30 receps. 4s box, 30 amp recep and plug, plate cover maybe $25.00 and just mount the boxes right on top each other...

[Bill Simmeth]

Anyway I can adapt the LVC to power both the jointer and feeder at the same time and still use seperate power buttons?
You could do this, but there are a couple of issues to consider and I'd not do it. As one poster hinted, you'd need to make sure your heaters are sized properly to handle the additional load of the feeder. They are probably not now (they are sized to just the jointer motor), so you'll need to change them out. That then means you are losing some measure of overload protection on your jointer motor whenever you run it without the feeder motor running. You would then place a mechanical switch between T1 & T2 in the starter and the feeder motor.

Most feeder motors I've seen (of any size that is) have an on-board thermal reset so a starter is redundant for overload protection. People usually just run them directly to the power circuit. If you wanted to streamline the cabling involved, you could run your power feeder cable into the LVC and tap onto L1 & L2. This places the load ahead of the mag starter avoiding the issues above. It does however "hard-wire" your feeder to your jointer making separation impossible. To overcome this you could do what I did on my shaper -- run a pigtail connected to L1 & L2 out of the starter box with a NEMA locking female plug on the end. Put the mating male plug on the end of the feeder cable. You now have one cable leaving the work station, separate control over jointer and feeder and you can separate them easily if needed.

[Rick Christopherson]

Mike, I am not clear as to the reasons you want to do this, and this has some bearing on the answers.

If you are just trying to run your shaper and feeder without needing a new circuit, then I would suggest installing a second outlet back at the junction box in the wall. Your 5 hp shaper and 1 hp feeder should be able to operate from the same 30 amp circuit. About the only time you will fully load a 5 hp shaper is if you are making raised panels in a single pass, or running a large moulding cutter. When fully loaded, the shaper will draw 20-24 amps and the feeder will only draw 5 amps, so even fully loaded, the circuit can handle the load. The 125% factor mentioned above applies to planning a circuit, not for utilizing it. It also doesn’t apply to cord and plug applications.

If your goal is to have to only turn on one switch to get both tools running, you’ll just have to set your beer down and use both hands to turn on the tools. :D Seriously, this would not be a good reason to tap into the motor contactor. As was previously mentioned, the overload protection on the contactor would not be the correct size to run both tools.

If you were contemplating this because you wanted the feeder to shut down if the shaper stalls, I don’t think this is anything to worry about. You have to really be abusing the motor before the overload thermals will trip, and by putting the feeder on the downstream side of the thermals, they would actually trip prematurely.

[Ryan Myers]

Most feeder motors I've seen (of any size that is) have an on-board thermal reset so a starter is redundant for overload protection. People usually just run them directly to the power circuit. If you wanted to streamline the cabling involved, you could run your power feeder cable into the LVC and tap onto L1 & L2. This places the load ahead of the mag starter avoiding the issues above. It does however "hard-wire" your feeder to your jointer making separation impossible. To overcome this you could do what I did on my shaper -- run a pigtail connected to L1 & L2 out of the starter box with a NEMA locking female plug on the end. Put the mating male plug on the end of the feeder cable. You now have one cable leaving the work station, separate control over jointer and feeder and you can separate them easily if needed.
I would not recommend this method, simply because motors are to expensive to replace.

Bill has a good idea with taping off the load side of the starter and this is perfectly to code. Just make sure your starter is rated for both loads and heaters are sized accordingly. You also need to make sure the cord, cord cap and receptacle are all capable of carying the load too.

In my opinion I would connect each unit seperately to a receptacle for ease of maintenance. And yes your cord caps/receptacles do need to be rated for at least amperage of the motors. But then you need to make sure both motors have thermal protection.

[J.R. Rutter]

I , too, have some feeders running off of pigtail twistlock receptacles coming out of the J box on the shaper. This makes it easy to shift things around if a feeder breaks down. This puts the load before the shaper starter heaters, so (potentially) you only have to up the size of the cord, circuit, and breaker. But as others have said, if you start them seperately, then there is probably no need.

I also have a shaper that came with the feeder wired downstream of the starter. The thermals were all burned out and the previous owner had bypassed them. Because I'm nowhere near using the motor to capacity, I haven't replaced them yet, but I should!

Here are pictures of the feeders on my jointers. Each is mounted on a cast iron slotted angle plate from Grizzly that is bolted to the body of the jointer.

[J.R. Rutter]

Forgot to mention one reason to have the feeder wired after the starter might be to have both cut off if an emergency stop is pushed. Any thoughts on how to do this short of buying a contactor and stop button to install before the jointer starter?