Extending Contactor Life With Motor Controllers

Contactors take a repeated beating every time a motor starts direct on-line. The current surge involved in a standard start puts real electrical stress on the contacts themselves, and over hundreds or thousands of start cycles, that stress accumulates into wear that eventually leads to failure and replacement, often at an inconvenient moment.

Integra from Suresense reduces this stress directly through its soft start function. Rather than switching the motor on at full current instantly, it ramps power up smoothly and without steps, meaning the contactor never has to handle the same abrupt surge it would during a conventional direct on-line start. The electrical load on the contact points is considerably lower as a result.

Over time, this translates into a meaningfully longer working life for contactors and related switchgear components, along with fewer unplanned replacements and less associated maintenance disruption. It's a benefit that sits alongside I

ntegra's main energy saving function, so businesses fitting the controller for running cost reasons also pick up this reduction in electrical component wear as a secondary, ongoing advantage across the equipment it's protecting.

This reduction in contactor wear applies across the full range of motor sizes Integra is fitted to, from smaller plant motors through to larger industrial installations running frequent start cycles throughout the day.