About 3 years ago I went to look at a 70 year old bandsaw with a view to renovating it. The original 3 ph 6 pole 5hp motor was in one tumbledown shed, and a gigantic 3" canvas belt ran into the adjacent wreck of a barn to the saw, via holes bashed through the columbage, [ mud and hazel wattle in an oak frame].
"Elle marche bien!" says the proud owner- "Regardez!"
He had wired it up, direct start, from a 400v 3 ph supply, with a domestic extension cord, using ground [green/yellow] as the 3rd phase. The "switch" turned out to be a half-wired decrepid star-delta device, lying on the dirt floor near the motor. He started it and we stumbled next door. In the barn the manky old saw blade, [ with 50% of its teeth missing], howled round at 1600 feet a minute, with no means of turning it off, as the fast-and-loose lever was rusted solid.
Ignorance is bliss.
Alan
