Newell Gurus

Learned two things today , 1. My squirrel cage motor went kaput.. 2. If your fire extinguisher is below full charge it will keep your generator from starting.. Safety measure

Interesting Marc. Does your Newell use a belt driven squirrel cage fan? Mine is about wore out. I'm thinking I'll rebuild it or replace. I would like to find a direct drive fan that would work in order to eliminate the belt.

i replaced the entire squirrel cage blower on both mine. it is a standard grainger dayton assembly. the original on the 90 had brass sleeves instead of bearings and i put on one with ball bearings. did the same for the 02. when setup right, there is no reason to worry about the fan belt and it certainly isnt enough of an issue to spend any time on it just to eliminate the belt.

the motor is a standard one you can get at any electrical motor shop and you can change it your self in an hour or so. not hard. just a little heavy. pretty unusual for that motor to go bad. i would have a electrical motor shop look at it to see what it needs. maybe have it as a spare or fix it.

tom

Tom,
Do you remember the belt size? Mine is looking aged, and am worried about it breaking. Should I just take it to Napa and ask them to find a match?

Thanks,
bill

Run a tape measure around it.

yea. the sizing is dependent on if they used exactly the same pullys. just take it off, measure it, take it to napa and get what fits.

tom

Perhaps it's just the capacitor ?

I'm not sure , I'm at the Grand Canyon right now , it went out 3 hours from here. We are driving to flagstaff in the morn to grainger, I'll call Newell first thing and ask them if there is anything else I should check.

Marc, We've had excellent results with generator work from Lofton Equipment in Phoenix. They are the official Kohler dealer for AZ, NM & west TX. Hopefully it's not that bad though.

I'm wondering if anyone has considered changing out the 120V fan for a 12V fan mounted directly to the radiator as it used on virtually all cars these days. Unlike with a car that turns it on and off with temperature it could run full time when the engine is running just as with the current setup. It seems to me this could be smaller, lighter and simpler (well maybe) than the current setup. Just curious what the rest of you think.