Thread Number: 36146
/ Tag: 50s/60s/70s Vacuum Cleaners
question about the Lewyt Electronic |
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Post# 387545 , Reply# 2   3/8/2018 at 23:18 (2,233 days old) by MadMan (Chicago, IL, USA)   |   | |
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Neat. I suppose as long as your house wiring is correct, and the vacuum's plug is polarized (correctly), AND the live metal bits were on the neutral side of the wiring, in theory you'd never get shocked even if there was a short.
I wonder maybe if they did not have polarized plugs? What's this about a rectifier though? Was it like... a DC motor that used diodes to rectify it? Most grounded appliances with exposed metal bits are *technically* live anyway, as ground is also neutral, but again, provided house wiring is correct - in theory, again - you'd never get shocked. Because anything else you could touch that's live would/should also be grounded/neutral. Also, getting shocked is always blown out of proportion. |
Post# 387788 , Reply# 4   3/11/2018 at 19:43 (2,230 days old) by MadMan (Chicago, IL, USA)   |   | |
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Nah, you would still feel 12 volts, believe me.
So what I'm gathering is that the power nozzle used something like 12 volts, and instead of having an expensive transformer onboard, they did some weird electrical shortcut and used the motor windings. Very much plausible. Though to be fair, silicon diodes were pretty expensive in those days. The thing is, in order to be electrocuted, you have to be touching TWO things at once. Perhaps the body of the machine was grounded and the wand - meant to be on a totally isolated circuit - when the thingy failed, put them on opposing ends of the same circuit? Idk. Fascinating though, I would like to know more about how all that worked. I always liked examining design flaws. In this case, a failing at failing safe. |
Post# 387876 , Reply# 5   3/12/2018 at 18:40 (2,229 days old) by Collector2 (Moose Jaw, Sk)   |   | |
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LOL to begin with it wasnt a rectifier. A rectifier only changes ac to dc.
The field winding of the motor had a secondary winding in with it. This, in effect, made the motor into a transformer as well. The 120V in the main (primary) winding induced a voltage in the secondary winding (24 volts I believe). As this created an isolated circuit the premise of using the body of the machine and the wand as a contact was sound. (In an isolated circuit you have to come in contact with both sides of the circuit to get a shock). The problem came when people overfilled the bags, causing the motor to heat. The varnish insulating the wires on the field winding would melt off, allowing the primary and secondary to short together. This would charge the body / wand with 120V. If you were holding it and came in contact with anything that was grounded (sink, radiator, concrete floor etc) you got a shock. Doug |
Post# 387887 , Reply# 7   3/12/2018 at 21:16 (2,229 days old) by MadMan (Chicago, IL, USA)   |   | |
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Collector2 - now THAT makes sense. I'll bet though that the motor wouldn't act so much as a transformer as a generator. But same difference.
n0oxy - I'm pretty sure most electric hoses don't have any exposed metal parts that are grounded (part of the circuit) and just use two wires that are insulated normally. |
Post# 387941 , Reply# 8   3/13/2018 at 11:33 (2,229 days old) by Collector2 (Moose Jaw, Sk)   |   | |
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Hey Mike
It was more an issue of the bag being constantly overfilled so the motor was run hot on many occasions. In retrospect, either better insulation or the addition of a thermocouple that cut the motor out when it got too hot (like new machines have) would probably have avoided the problem. Present day electric hoses use two electrical connections rather than using the actual handgrip as a connection (as Lewyt did) so you dont have the problem of coming in contact with power. And yes, I have seen several machines that were taken care of and not overheated. They still work perfectly. Doug |
Post# 387988 , Reply# 10   3/13/2018 at 21:02 (2,228 days old) by Collector2 (Moose Jaw, Sk)   |   | |
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Post# 388000 , Reply# 12   3/14/2018 at 01:49 (2,228 days old) by huskyvacs (Gnaw Bone, Indiana)   |   | |
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The only way to find out I guess is for someone to test it with a multimeter and see how much voltage actually goes through it?
Also I am not sure if these vacuums were advertised as wet pick up (I see a lot of them rusty inside on online photos). If they were advertised as wet pickup like a shop vac, with this unique shock hazard on the handle, and you're standing on a wet rug holding the handle, it would be curtains for you. |
Post# 388017 , Reply# 13   3/14/2018 at 08:46 (2,228 days old) by Kirbyvertibles (Independence, KS)   |   | |
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Post# 388018 , Reply# 14   3/14/2018 at 08:47 (2,228 days old) by Kirbyvertibles (Independence, KS)   |   | |
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Post# 388038 , Reply# 15   3/14/2018 at 11:40 (2,228 days old) by Collector2 (Moose Jaw, Sk)   |   | |
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How much of a shock you got would depend on a number of factors. Where in the winding the short developed, how well grounded you were etc. I have never heard if anyone was killed but it is possible as you are holding the handgrip in one hand and, should you touch something, like a sink, that is well grounded with the other hand the power would be going across the heart. As far as I know though the majority of the people just got shocks. Of course everyone has to jump on the band wagon and try to get something when there is a lawsuit.
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Post# 388051 , Reply# 16   3/14/2018 at 14:24 (2,228 days old) by dirtmaster37 (Ypsilanti, Michigan USA)   |   | |
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In a previous thread about the Lewyt Electronic, there was a post, from Aeoliandave (sp), containing the legal patent papers he had found, and posted up then. These "papers" are what was filed with the U.S. Patent offices by Carl, thru the Lewyt Corporation, to explain what HE "invented", and to summarily keep others from "stealing" HIS/ Lewyt's idea.. In this text, with detailed, engineering/ engineered drawings, explains, in the greatest of detail, the actual workings of this (non-electronic) wonder cleaner. So the WHY's and HOW's of the Lewyt Electronic if you will.
So- Carl Meyerhoffer's thinking, was that a secondary winding, properly insulated by a varnish from the iron stator..i.e lamination's in his words, held water to create the step-down voltage required to make his contraption work.. His views were supplanted by his carefully worded text, which only cast out a possibility of trouble AS LONG AS the metal wands and hose hand-grip did NOT come into contact with any other metal surface that could constitute as a ground. Possibly later, the heat of the motor was a trouble spot, as Doug from Canada, and others have suggested; but it wasn't mentioned in the 1961 patent information. Ironically, by the date on the patent paper, June 13, 1961; the Lewyt Corporation was pretty much dead. In Most NORMAL operation, he goes on in technical mumbo-jumbo, to explain that the step-down circuit shouldn't or should NOT come into play with any ground; while said machine was running. Meyerhoffer in jargon filled patent papers ambles up to this point about 35,000 words in, it seems. Ones understanding of that text, that, if the latter DID happen, it "could ground together" the primary and secondary winding's. And, POSSIBLY, MAYBE could caused an electrocution to happen. The text chooses NOT to clarify if it was an immediate possibility, or within a few moments, or at all. Just that it COULD happen. So, as the varnish used to isolate the two fields started to melt off, thats when the danger happens..Only after a few more words of jargon does he intimate that it WAS possible that your vacuum would then be sending 110v out the metal parts; straight up into your body. This issue could be compounded even MORE SO if milady or miseuer happened to be grounded in some way themselves. Again touching a water pipe, anything that COULD ground ones person. In the text, it say :such as touching a water-pipe, a stove, something metal anyways. RIGHT THERE IN THE TEXT. I have searched the internet pretty thoroughly, when one get into a sleuth y, historian minded mode; and, have YET to find any published article, or support that any such deaths from said electrocution existed. That said, it clearly happened. Lore of a thing/item or person rarely happens overnight, or stays consistent for nearly 6 decades now. I mean, ask anyone who has an Edsel. In the late 1950's, there were few if ANY consumer advocacy groups. Class-action lawsuits weren't even heard of (not that they didn't exist), and certainly the media insulated us from such things usually. Also, the incidents were decades away from easy to orchestrate, public/social media blasts so common today. Moreover, something WAS big enough to bring Lewyt down, to bee sold off in part, to Shetland in 1962. So, does anyone out there actually have "some" printed proof of the lawsuits, and deaths? Please bring forth once and for all! I have seen finally in person a Lewyt Electronic,at a recent vacuum convention, owned by Kirbyvertibles, who has added to this thread. His works properly (not in pieces), or had the circuitry snipped out inside the cleaner to undo the circuits that clearly failed previously. It's living proof, that in a different time, with better ACTUAL electronic circuitry it probably would HAVE worked, SAFELY. It is, in fact a marvel of it's time, so long as ALL the connections were tight and the motor step-down worked properly. You have to admit tho , it solved a real problem that still exists to this DAY, meaning having to engineer a complete 110v circuit for every canister-upright/power-team that is extant. And so on the Lewyt Electronic goes.... CLICK HERE TO GO TO dirtmaster37's LINK |
Post# 388077 , Reply# 18   3/14/2018 at 22:10 (2,227 days old) by MadMan (Chicago, IL, USA)   |   | |
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I'm still a little unclear as to whether that would be a motor-generator, or a motor-transformer. By the schematic, I'm leaning towards transformer. But either way, it seems like a clever way of lowering manufacturing cost. They were winding the motor already, they just add a little extra, as opposed to either making or buying a totally separate transformer.
Speaking as someone who's been electrocuted more times than I can remember, nobody died from that, unless they were an elderly person with a heart condition. I've been zapped even arm to arm several times, it's harmless. Pretty much the only way 120vac could kill you is if you make toast while taking a saltwater bath. Or, you know, sticking electrodes into your heart. |
Post# 388106 , Reply# 19   3/15/2018 at 09:09 (2,227 days old) by kirbyvertibles (Independence, KS)   |   | |
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Mike. The first one in 1957 was not called the Electronic. It was the Lewyt Automatic upright beater sweeper or something like that. They called the first power nozzle an upright. The next model in 1958 was the first to be called Electronic and of course the next and last model was also Electronic in 1959-60
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Post# 388213 , Reply# 20   3/16/2018 at 09:42 (2,226 days old) by dysonman1 (the county)   |   | |
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Mike:
You can see all three Lewyt Electronics (two are 'zappers') at the next convention of Vacuum Cleaner Collectors - June 14 - 16, at the Vacuum Cleaner Museum in St. James. Hans Craig has been kind enough to see that the Museum has all three models - I'm going to South Carolina next weekend and will bring them home with me. |
Post# 388301 , Reply# 22   3/17/2018 at 09:33 (2,225 days old) by n0oxy (Saint Louis Missouri, United States)   |   | |
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Yes, I believe 120 volts could kill a person, I'm sure it has, I've heard that getting shocked with a 240 volt outlet is even worse though, which would make sense. Mike |
Post# 388329 , Reply# 23   3/17/2018 at 15:55 (2,225 days old) by dysonman1 (the county)   |   | |
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