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dadof3and3

Starting Multiple Motors / Pumps

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Greetings,

We (in the steel industry) have many pumps / motors (large and small).  Generally we use soft-starts,  cross-line starters (E3+) or even Flex drives. There may be several motors in a pool to start where we need only say 2 of 3 to be running at any one time  When it's time to start them, we may need to stagger start them, if one fails, the spare may need to start.  My question to the group is... Are there any philosophies out there (and hopefully pseudo or actual code) as to how to start a subset of motors/pumps within a pool of motors and maintain the configuration running ?

I appreciate any and all comments.

David 

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Flowchart, flowchart, flowchart.  It has never failed me, yet.

For controlling multiple motors at the same time, as long as the soft starter/motor drive has a Motor Running feedback tag, you should be good to go.  Otherwise one will have to add current transformers (CTs) with PLC analog inputs to give you feedback that a motor is in fact running.

What I would do...PLC code with one Start tag to start a motor with a sealing branch that has the stop command to drop out the sealing branch; the Motor #1 Start tag coil would be driven by all of the conditions to start and seal it in or drop out the sealing branch (this is where your concise flowchart comes into play).  You can envision all of the conditions you would want alarms for...a motor is instructed to start and there is no run feedback after time, etc.

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