Originally Posted by
Mark Wooden
I didn't see it mentioned, but older motors were rated differently than they are today; your 1 hp will have a much better power curve than a newer motor and probably out perform a 1.5hp new motor.
I'm afraid that's not correct. We've known how to test motors for HP for a long time and the definition of a HP has not changed. In any case, there's no free lunch. The energy for the HP has to come from somewhere and it comes from the voltage and current of the motor. If anything, old motors were not as efficient as newer motors so I'd actually expect that they would take more current (at a particular voltage) to produce the rated HP than a new motor.
Some people glamorize old things and I think this belief is part of that glamorization.
Mike
[Some of the old Unisaws had low horsepower repulsion-induction motors. On those motors, if you started to stall the motor, which was easy to do because the motor was low HP, the starting system would kick in and add some power. The problem is that the motor was not designed to operate that way and it was drawing excessive current when it was pushed that way. Also, the starting system only kicked in when the RPMs of the motor went down quite a bit so you were attempting to cut with a blade not at full speed.
Rather than use a motor that way, you'd do better to just install a motor with sufficient HP. That way, you won't stall the motor and you'll be cutting at the RPMs that the blade was designed for.]
Mike
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