[PSUBS-MAILIST] Yet another compensator method

Tue Jul 7 16:38:32 EDT 2020

Thanks Vance,
that was interesting, especially the encapsulation of the windings & stator,
& machining of it. That is added security seeing it is a sealed oil filled unit
anyway. Blue robotics does a small open brushless ROV motor that just uses non corrosive bearings & epoxy coated stator & rotor. Maybe we could emulate that
on a larger scale?
Alan

> On 8/07/2020, at 12:17 AM, via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> wrote:
> 
> None of the above. For compensation, the motors use a top hat diaphragm with a bolted retention ring on the front end of the thruster, with a free flooding fiberglas cap. The bladder itself was an airbrake diaphragm out of the truck parts catalogue. There was also the electrical penetration in the side boss, plus the top and bottom oil fill/vent fittings, then the planetary gear case, followed by the shaft bearing and primary seal case and then, finally, the prop. We used a 16-spring Crane carbon face seal as I recall, and a 14 X 14 four blade prop cut to tolerance for the cast and machined to match Kort nozzle.
> 
> They did all they could to make them work well. The motors were wound in-house with square wire, for efficiency. Plus the rotors and stators were epoxy cast, and then machined to close tolerances (to minimize rotationally induced turbulence). But, they were high efficiency 5 horsepower, 120 volt, 60+ amp DC motors, which meant the brushes were always going to be a problem, and were more of a problem at depth (the oil under pressure tends to weasel into the brush/rotor interface, which caused arcing).
> 
> We usually drained and flushed the whole thing as part of regular service, and on occasion, based on oil color, as the arcing put trace particulates of conductive material into the mix (it looked like old crankcase oil). Also, the Shell hydraulic oil was/is transparent red, and about a tablespoon of seawater will turn it into pink foam. Which was an oh, shit moment, because then we had to tear the damned thing down AGAIN, and find the leak.
> 
> Vance
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Alan via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org>
> To: Personal Submersibles General Discussion <personal_submersibles at psubs.org>
> Sent: Mon, Jul 6, 2020 6:55 pm
> Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Yet another compensator method
> 
> Vance,
> did those compensated motors have an attached or built in compensator 
> to over-pressurise them?
> Am wondering where the oil was getting out / water was getting in, was it just 
> running out through the shaft seals?
> Cheers Alan
> 
>> On 7/07/2020, at 9:12 AM, via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> wrote:
>> 
>> The all-the-air thing is engineer speak for mostly-kinda-sorta-all-the-air
>> 
>> My experience with the compensated Hyco built Hymak motors says that the only time you get all the air out is when it's an accident. And even if you started out that way, we were likely to have a little air when we got back, mostly from internal turbulence and the minor brush arcing that got worse as we went deeper.
>> 
>> Meaning that checking for salt water intrusion and topping up the oil in a Hymak was done after EVERY dive, even on Aquarius in the Gulf of Mexico, where we were only diving in the 200-300 foot range.
>> 
>> Those little air bubbles are just part of the cost of doing business. They were why we bought compensating oil in 55 gallon drums.
>> 
>> The cool thing with the Hymaks was that the whole process took about two minutes.
>> 
>> Vance
>> 
>> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Rick Patton via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org>
>> To: Personal Submersibles General Discussion <personal_submersibles at psubs.org>
>> Sent: Mon, Jul 6, 2020 2:15 pm
>> Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Yet another compensator method
>> 
>> I have always heard from the group that it was imperative to get ALL the air out due to the compression difference between air and liquid so I will be using small IV bags attached to the housing that I found on line that are only about 3" square and my plan was to exhaust all of the air out of the housing and the bag as well with the bag having just a very small quantity of oil in it to feed the housing if needed but the bag would easily inflate with the expanding oil as needed as it is very flexible. Haven't gotten that far yet but that was what I came up with when I was trying to go to sleep one night. This way I never have any compressible gas in the system yet have a bladder that flexes easily with hot oil and visa versa. Open to suggestions??
>> Rick
>> 
>> On Mon, Jul 6, 2020 at 7:36 AM Brian Cox via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> wrote:
>> I think a way to simply leave it open should be figured out.  
>> 
>> Brian
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --- personal_submersibles at psubs.org wrote:
>> 
>> From: Alec Smyth via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org>
>> To: Personal Submersibles General Discussion <personal_submersibles at psubs.org>
>> Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Yet another compensator method
>> Date: Mon, 6 Jul 2020 13:15:52 -0400
>> 
>> Sorry, my understanding is the exact opposite. Thermal expansion/contraction volumes of the oil are significant, but of much smaller magnitude than gas volume changes due to pressure if the amount of air in the system is not absolutely minimal. Lets say your air bubble was half the volume of the bellows, which is about what it looks like in the photo. If you go to 350 feet, you will be adding a little more than 10 atmospheres, so the bubble will only be about a tenth its original volume and the bellows will have to contract about 45%. I'm not saying it cannot, you might be just fine. But as you dive to your 350 feet, the water will also get cold, so the oil will contract too. Quantifying how much would depend on the temperature differential and the volume of oil. But my point is BOTH the air and the oil are contracting. If their deltas were in opposite directions, say with the air contracting and the oil expanding, then one could argue an air bubble absorbs the expansion. I did once do the math for thermal expansion/contraction on Snoopy's thrusters, and it made me switch from just using the coiled length of hose method to adopting what looks like the exact same bellows you have in the photo. I selected that bellows because it had a volume appropriate to the thermal expansion calculation. However, if you add the gas delta to that, I'm not sure the math would have still added up.
>> 
>> And yes, filling these things with oil so there's no or minimal bubble is a REAL pain!
>> 
>> 
>> Best,
>> Alec
>> 
>> On Mon, Jul 6, 2020 at 10:29 AM James Frankland via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> wrote:
>> The air bubble is for a few reasons.
>> 
>> 1. To allow easier expansion of the oil if required, even though its enclosed.
>> 2. Seems impossible to completely eliminate it, so thought id go with it.
>> 3.  Some people said you should have a bubble last time i brought this up!  
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On Mon, 6 Jul 2020 at 15:16, Alec Smyth via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> wrote:
>> Looks good to me, but why have an air bubble? I always tried like crazy to eliminate it, since that is what expands or contracts most.
>> 
>> Thanks,
>> Alec
>> 
>> On Mon, Jul 6, 2020 at 10:00 AM hank pronk via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> wrote:
>> James, that looks great-the air bubble is good also.  
>> Hank
>> 
>> On Monday, July 6, 2020, 7:31:46 AM MDT, James Frankland via Personal_Submersibles <personal_submersibles at psubs.org> wrote:
>> 
>> 
>> Hi All
>> 
>> Getting Jodie B ready for diving in the next week or so.
>> I have changed the motor compensator yet again as the last enclosed one didnt really have a proper flexible part and I think the oil expanded a bit over time and leaked out through the seals.  Just a tiny bit, but enough to put some air back in the pipe.
>> 
>> Anyway, the new method is simply a tube with belows.  These are from a toilet flush and have been sitting full of oil for a couple of weeks to see if anything happens.  They seem good, so i have installed them. The motor is completely filled with oil and the bellows have a small amount of air.  They compress easily, so should provide pressure compensation while also allowing the oil to expand if required.
>> 
>> The bellows will be covered with an open ended tube for protection.  Just got to make a strap for those.
>> 
>> Any comments?
>> Thanks
>> James
>> 
>> <20200704_142240.jpg>
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