My Lopi Declaration blower started making an awful humming noise last night. It would still run but until I turned it to high it would make this humming noise. The service guy can't get here for over a week so I thought I would get some advice from y'all, and see if i can get this fixed before paying a service fee. Thanks in advance for the help.
Lopi declaration blower
- Thread starter kattpound
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I'm not sure how much they are going to charge you for a service call, but I seriously doubt there are any serviceable parts on the blower. If it were me, I would take it off the stove and try blowing it out with compressed air. make sure to blow out the ends of the blower shaft where the bearing would be. Then try squirting a little oil in those bearing to see if you can free them up. A humming noise to me tells me something is binding and the fans can't rotate freely.
The blower is still under warranty so it would just be the charge to come out to change it if it is bad. I pulled the front cover off and used blew it out the best i could with no luck but I will try removing it and cleaning a little better. thanks for the idea.
maverick06
Minister of Fire
I had a noise in mine once, probably different. I forget what was causing it, something with the rubber mounts. I think i was just able to wiggle the blower a bit and it fixed it. See if the blowers spin freely, or if they are getting hung up on something that got sucked in.
Let me know. Always wondered what I will do when they die, which they will eventually.
Let me know. Always wondered what I will do when they die, which they will eventually.
eba1225
Feeling the Heat
I had my blower go within the first year. I took it off and went to the shop and they gave me a new one, no charge. Now that I am no longer under warranty I will have to get a little more creative and see if I can find a motor/blower elsewhere cheaper as they probably are expensive.
Have you tried pushing lightly on the sheet metal in several places?
It sounds like a vibration is hitting a resonant frequency. If you press on the sheet metal and it stops, consider putting something against it there to dampen the vibration.
Sometimes just unscrewing the fan and moving it a little will do the trick or make it worse. Just try it.
The service guy is going to gladly replace your blower.
MnDave
It sounds like a vibration is hitting a resonant frequency. If you press on the sheet metal and it stops, consider putting something against it there to dampen the vibration.
Sometimes just unscrewing the fan and moving it a little will do the trick or make it worse. Just try it.
The service guy is going to gladly replace your blower.
MnDave
thewoodlands
Minister of Fire
Did you clean it with a vacuum cleaner, it will get dust & dirt in it causing it to make that noise.
thewoodlands
Minister of Fire
Did you try blowing it out with a air compressor? We have the Lopi Liberty with the blower, so far I just vacuum the areas that have screens.
I had a furnace inducer fan motor make a high pitched noise. I put a few drops of 3-in-1 motor oil (20 weight I think) on the shaft and the sound stopped.
MnDave
MnDave
Well I blew them out with a compressor and no change. I unplugged each one at a time to see if I could figure out which one it was but both made the noise. The fans turn but very slowly until the switch is turned almost to high. Could it be the switch is bad and not sending the proper voltage on the lower speeds? just thinking out loud.
Do the cages spin freely or is there a drag?
Is the noise more of a hum?
Is there a start capacitor on the motor?
MnDave
Everything spins free with no noise when turning by hand or blowing with compressed air.
It is a very loud low hum, however the cages spin just not as fast as they should.
There is no external capacitor that I can see.
Thanks for the thoughts
The hum is caused by what I will call "rotor confusion". The motor hums because it is internally confused about which way to spin.
These are small synchronous motors(i.e. the RPM matches the AC line frequency, 60 Hz).
Larger motors use a capacitor to start the motor. This is how a larger synch motor knows which way to spin.
On smaller motors they can start themselves unless there is too much drag or there is a problem in the wiring.
If you could not oil the bearings or if it did not work then you probably have a bad connection internally.
Glad to hear that it is under warranty. Maybe you could simply bring it to them and save the cost of a service call.
MnDave
they did say I could bring it in for no charge but they are 40 miles away so I would have to see what the charge would be and weigh my options.
Would it make sense that both blowers would do this at the same time or did one go out and not make enough noise to notice until the other went bad?
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