So today was the day to install this shallow well submersible for my family's new house build.

It went really well. Pitless installed. Torque arrester, Dole flow control valve, wiring. On a scale of one to ten. It was a ten.

Now the bad. After all that we decided to run the pump off of a generator. 3500 watt Champion.
The pump is a 1/2hp 230 volt 3 wire with control box.
Did not have the plug but was able to get on at a local store that had the right one.

I had a guy who was the brains of the operation for the most part. I have a good background in water well equipment. So between the two of us we were pretty savvy to do this job.
When wiring the plug we had some questions as there were three wires but the plug had four lugs.
This is where the trouble started.

We agreed on where to connect the wires to the plug. The instructions where not great.

We got everything ready to go. Fired up the generator. Let it run for a bit and then plugged it is. Pump fired right up after filling the line water came out of the pipe which was a 1" and open ended. The flow did not seem to be adequate based on my knowledge of what the pump should do based on the pump curve for my model.
Ran for maybe 6-8 minutes and then kicked off. Shut the generator down. Waited a bit after checking things. Tried again. Same deal.

Went through everything again. Pulling the pump is pretty simple as is only set at about 30'.


After some head scratching thinking maybe the generator was or problem I related that I thought maybe the plug was not wired correctly. Went back and went through that it looks like one of hot legs was not correctly connected to the right lug.

got it reconnected to the correct lug. Fired the pump and it runs and will pump water without tripping out. But still does not pump the volume or pressure it is supposed to. Thinking we probably damaged the motor. we ohmmed the motor legs based on the reading on the control box one legs was fine. The other is reading 12 and it is supposed to read between 16.5 and 20.5.
I am thinking that this is not a good sign and a reflection that we problem damaged the motor.

If I had to guess it would seem we are running a 230v motor on a 115 volts hence the lack of performance.

If you feel the need go ahead and flame me. But am looking more for some suggestions or confirmation on what I think is the case. Or maybe I am wrong.

What do you guys think?

If I need to replace the motor that is not a huge deal or expense that I can't handle. The pump end should be fine we believe?

Thanks guys.

Did you read the voltage and confirm what the voltage was ? I can't imagine a 230 volt motor would run at all on 115v .

Old Rugged Cross....for this family home, don't you have a general contractor with reliable subcontractors ? Or are you trying to general this build yourself ?

quote:

Originally posted by Genorogers:
Old Rugged Cross....for this family home, don't you have a general contractor with reliable subcontractors ? Or are you trying to general this build yourself ?

Not sure what this has to do with my post.


If you want to flame me for not knowing what I am doing feel free. But we do know how to do this.

Yes we may have made and electrical mistake. It was done by a professional pump man with my blessing.

Yes, to a degree. Pretty much everyone is struggling with reliable subs these days. Not just here.

I am doing several things on this project to help save some $ for the family member. The pump system being one, fwiw.

Been a long time on well work for me, most installs were 1 1/2 HP , around 600' to 800'. This generator you have with the 4 wire plug, that sounds like that is a RV connection.

The plug-on RV with a 50 amp service has four prongs.

A 110-120 volt hot (live) wire (L1).
A second 110-120 volt hot (live) wire (L2).
One neutral wire.
A ground wire.
https://www.rvrank.com/post/is-50-amp-110-or-220
Above is a quote from one of many articles about them.

The Champion description mentions this as well. https://www.championpowerequip...3500-watt-generator/

What caught my attention was the 3500 generator, seemed small even for a 1/2 horse, we ran 10kw minimum generator on the 1 1/2 HP motors.
Put the wiring back on that generator plug, if someone plugs their RV into it, it will smoke everything on the camper. Find a 7.5kw generator to run the pump.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: rizzle,

In looking at new generators to feed my house after a hurricane, I found no 3,500watt generators that produced 240v. They were all 120v only. This made sense because 3,500watts would only be 15amps at 240v which isn’t enough to power any of my 240 loads. The wires from the generator are hooked in parallel for a 120v 30amp outlet, or separately to two 120v 15amp outlets.

I don’t know about well pump motors, but the pool pump and boat lift motors I’ve installed could be wired for 120v or 240v.

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
The pump is a 1/2hp 230 volt 3 wire with control box.

By "3-wire with a control box" do you mean there are three wires + ground, for four wires total, or two wires + ground, for three wires total, coming from the pump?

Here's an explanation of the difference:



When you say "control box" do you mean a control box for a three-wire pump or simply a pressure switch?

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
When wiring the plug we had some questions as there were three wires but the plug had four lugs.
This is where the trouble started.

Does the plug look like this?



A 240VAC load will use X (L1), Y (L2), and ground. Neutral (W) is only used if you're feeding a split-phase load.

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
We agreed on where to connect the wires to the plug. The instructions where not great.

Not trying to be a smart-ass, but, a mistake made by committee is still a mistake

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
After some head scratching thinking maybe the generator was or problem I related that I thought maybe the plug was not wired correctly. Went back and went through that it looks like one of hot legs was not correctly connected to the right lug.

ICBW, cuz I'm not a well pump motor expert, but, I'd be surprised a 240VAC well pump motor would run at all on 120VAC, much less pump any appreciable volume of water.

Here's an extensive article on submersible well pump wiring and trouble-shooting: Water Pump Wiring Troubleshooting & Repair

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
If you want to flame me for not knowing what I am doing feel free. But we do know how to do this.

Going by what you've posted, I don't know as you can reasonably make that argument

Our old well guy knew what he was doing. Installed & wired it all and it just worked. Our new well guy knew what he was doing. Installed & wired and it just worked.

You and your well guy appear to be doing a lot of SWAG'ing.

quote:

Originally posted by rizzle:
What caught my attention was the 3500 generator, seemed small even for a 1/2 horse, ...

It would be marginal, but, should be doable. (I would've installed a VFD pump, or at least a soft-start pump, to reduce startup load.)

We had a 1/3 HP 2 in. jet well when I bought our 4,000W, 5,000W surge, generator. The generator could run the furnace, refrigerator, family room HT system, the home LAN and main server, and well pump, and still start the 1/3 HP sump well w/o appreciable sag. (I tested it.)

But, when we later upgraded the well to a 4 in. well with a 240VAC, 18 GPM, 1 HP pump, that pump starting up would really produce a sag. Now that we've a VFD pump, also 18 GPM and 1 HP, pump startup doesn't affect the generator at all.

quote:

The pump is a 1/2hp 230 volt 3 wire with control box

Ok, I'll bite, what's in the box! Soft start? VFD? Fuse block? Overload? Just a terminal block?

3500 watts is more than enough "power" to run a 1/2 HP motor(~370 watts running, perhaps 3700 watts to start it for a fraction of a second), IF it starts, which it did, apparently.

For all the typing going on, there is nearly NO information...

Thank you guys. Yes Ensig, that is the plug.

As I said, where we got into trouble was with the generator. Everything thing else went perfectly. Should of waited for the electrician to get on the job but will be a few weeks and wanted to see the pump run. Anyway, we will have to see. I am not a 100% the pump motor is toast. We'll have to continue on the journey to find out.

I did not want to go vfd. There are only two conventional motors. A 2 wire. no con. box or a three wire with con. box.

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
There are only two conventional motors. A 2 wire. no con. box or a three wire with con. box.

Either way: The wiring to the electrical supply is the same: L1 (X), L2 (Y), and ground.

In the case of a two-wire pump:

pump (motor) - 2 wires - pressure switch - 2 wires - electrical service

Three-wire pump:

pump (motor) - 3 wires - motor start controller - two wires - pressure switch - 2 wires - electrical service

In each case: Wire count does not incl. ground.

Good luck with it, ORC.

Why are you using a generator at all ? Is there no permanent power to the house ? Even a temporary construction service should have 240 volts . Just hook the damn thing up and give it a shot . This is way more complicated than it needs to be .

The house is under const. The well is 130' or there abouts from the house. As I said, it is going to be a while before the elect. shows up. .

If this was a larger than 1/2hp unit we would not of tried to run it off of a generator.
Did we make a mistake miswiring the plug initially, yes we did. That is a fact. I admitted that right up front. Did that damage the motor. Maybe. Still to be determined.

I appreciate the thoughts guy.

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
Did we make a mistake miswiring the plug initially, yes we did. That is a fact. I admitted that right up front. Did that damage the motor. Maybe. Still to be determined.

Normally, with many motors, prolonged under-voltage will damage the motor. But, your well pump motor is sitting down there in a gigantic heat sink: The cold water at the bottom of the well. On the gripping hand: You did run it for quite some time the first time. So I dunno.

Another thought: Are you certain the aquifer in which the pump's sitting is actually capable of supplying water at the rate your pump's demanding it?

Here's our well guy cleaning out the bottom of our well and doing a capacity test:

https://www.linxnet.com/misc/V...0517/Volume_Test.mp4

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
The house is under const. The well is 130' or there abouts from the house. As I said, it is going to be a while before the elect. shows up. .

If this was a larger than 1/2hp unit we would not of tried to run it off of a generator.
Did we make a mistake miswiring the plug initially, yes we did. That is a fact. I admitted that right up front. Did that damage the motor. Maybe. Still to be determined.

I appreciate the thoughts guy.

Any generator with a 220v outlet would run that, when new wells are drilled, there is no power around to test it, pump companies use a generator to do the draw down test.
Your generator does not have this outlet, I realize that you understand it had low voltage, but it was more than just a wiring problem.

Riz my generator did have the RV 125/250 volt plug that ensig showed a pix of. Is that plug not the power source I need. There is a toggle switch on it that says 240v

You can't use that plug for 220v on a 3500w generator, there are no 220v 3500w generators as trapper mentioned above. With the control box you may very well run the pump at 110v, at half rate performance, it may still run but the life of it is most likely been decreased.

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
Riz my generator did have the RV 125/250 volt plug that ensig showed a pix of.

With four connections, not three?

quote:

Originally posted by old rugged cross:
There is a toggle switch on it that says 240v

That seems odd.

What is the exact model number of your generator? When I look up "3500 watt Champion generator" I see a generator the user's manual of which mentions 240V, but, the plug detail for which shows only 120V outlets of various configurations.

Rv's are 110v. You can have a RV outlet 110v 30amp or a 110v 50 amp. The 50 amp is for running stuff like a/c, water heater all at the same time and not pop a breaker. RV 50amp plug is two 110v lines that total 220v, but it is not a true household 220v circuit.

ORC, is this what your generator's panel looks like?



That's the panel for the only 3500W portable generator Champion currently lists.

There are no 240VAC outlets on that panel.