I know we have some electrical geniuses in our midst, so this question is for y'all.
It's my Model T's trailer with 12VDC winch; Winch wouldn't work, so I did some troubleshooting and found that the remote switch was inoperative. I opened-up the case and found that one of the two wires to the switch had a resister in line. A very small resister. Burned black, so I couldn't determine it's value.
I eliminated that resister, and wired the switch in without it.
It works fine now, but I'm wondering; 1. is that resister totally necessary? And 2. if so why?
Thanx,
Bob
"Resistance is futile"
The resistance keeps you from burning the motor out when it's at full stop.
Modern Fords use a thermistor in the connector for all kinds of motorized devices like power windows and locks. The thermistor is about one ohm when cool, and increases resistance when hot, like from someone keeping the power to the motor at the end of its travel. The thermistors grow in resistance from age or misuse, until the device refuses to operate. Most of the time, the motor is replaced with a new one having a new thermistor in its connector.
The T-tightwad fix: Find and pull the thermistor out of the connector, and compress it with a vise until it reads about one ohm. It's a little wafer with stainless faces about 1 cm square. It's surprising how much pressure it takes. They are tough little buggers.
For you, Bob, maybe Frys has thermistors, or Mar-Vac in Costa Mesa.
May not have been a resister. Could have been an inline fuse. Being burned it could be hard to determine. Would suggest googling the manufacturer of the wench and see if there might be a service manual available or a "contact us" on the site.
Lol I wanna know about this place making wenches!! Wonder how much one would cost?
200 doubloons, ye scurvy nave!
Unlikely it was a resistor. Winches (wenches ?) draw quite a few amps at full load. Even a small inline resistance would have to be built to withstand 5 to 10 watts minimum (probably much more), and believe me .. you wouldn't describe such a resistor as "very small".
I have disassembled many boat trailer winches and never found such an animal. Best guess is some sort of inline fuse as Harry suggested. Should be a fuse in the circuit somewhere anyways.
Electric golf carts use a resistor across the solenoid to prevent arcing on the contacts.Cant explain it technically but I know it from reading the schematics and troubleshooting them.
Could be the same here.It will work with out it but the control solenoid may burn out quicker.
Are you sure it was a resistor or a diode? Many relays have a diode across the switch side to discharge the magnetic field collapse. This keeps you from getting a shock when operating the switch. The voltage can be near a coil's secondary voltage and can give you quite a jolt.
I should have said the diode is across the control side or coil. This is the side of a relay where a low current switch controls the activation of the coil that then pulls-in the high current side of a relay. When the switch is turned off, the magnetic field collapses and generates a high tension pulse or flyback.
I think Mack Cole nailed it. I did some research on the subject of using a resister in-line with a switch, and it seems it is a means of reducing or eliminating arcing at the points.
However, I learned that a resister is the least effective device for this purpose, (and that agrees with the fact that this is a cheapo winch). It has the same effect that a condenser has in reducing points arc in our engine's distributors.
(but I came to you guys first - then did my research!)
Thanx,
Bob