Another Back-Slapping Event

It happened today, a Saturday.

It started at about eight in the morning when I went in search of a DPDT electrical switch. That’s a double pole double throw switch to the uniformed.

I needed this as the Metop rotary switch that I worked on last week did not function correctly. It reversed the polarity I needed to feed to the motor’s starter winding, but as soon as I switched it on it tripped my Earth Leakage, This confused me but I soon figured out that I was connecting negative to positive at the starter junction, I spent some more time on the fact-finding internet and discovered I needed the DPDT switch specially designed to reverse polarity.

I decided on paying a call on an electrical wholesaler, who I knew stocked most items required when one re-wires a house, I’d visited them on numerous occasions in the past and they were very agreeable to a ten percent discount if you paid in cash.

It was a twenty-minute drive over to Albertskroon and I said hello to the manager, Adam, a very affable Asian chap. I had waited till the weekend as I knew on Friday he would be closed, as he had to attend his Muslim lunchtime rituals, which sometimes extended well into the afternoon with a feast of assorted samosas and kneeling to the east.

“Hi, how’s it Adam.”

“Can’t complain,” he replied, “what can I do for you Cess?”

“I’m looking for a DPDT switch so that I can reverse the polarity to the starter winding of a motor to get it spinning anticlockwise,”

His jaw dropped, conveying that he had not the foggiest idea what I was talking about.

“Sorry, what’s that?”

“It’s a switch with six terminals, two for the positive and neutral inputs, and four others that you cross-bridge, and then you take leads to the motor you wish to run in reverse.”

He still looked none the wiser.

“The guys that know all that stuff don’t work on a Saturday, I’m sorry.”

“You got a computer? Google a DPDT switch.”

“OK,” and he ambled to the far end of the counter replying in about twenty seconds, “Oh I see. Ja, an illuminated rocker switch, off and two ons.”

“That’s what I want, you got?”

“Err…... no. I have seen them in the shop, but not in a while.”

“Oh, well that’s great. Can you help me with ten 4mm ferrels, ten 10mm ferrels, a 2 x4 metal box, and a blank 4 x 4 bank cover plate with the skeleton behind it.”

“Plastic or metal?”

“Whichever is the cheaper.”

“Plastic, only twelve Rand,”

“That’ll do. You can tot it up, thanks.”

“All in all, forty bucks, cash?

“Great, yeah. Do you know where I might get a DPDT?”

“There’s an appliance repair shop near the Checkers just down the road and a Cash-Crusaders, right next door and there’s Mickles. You could try them.”

“Cash-Crusaders, they’re a porn shop, aren’t they?”

“Ja, but you never know.”

Paying my forty Rand and exiting with my plastic bag of goodies I departed, “See ya Adam.”

Another four-minute drive to the Checkers site, where I found Cash-Crusaders, the appliance repairer, but not a sight of Mickles. Even the parking attendants had never heard of it and the Cash-Crusaders didn’t open till nine o’clock. I ventured into the appliance shop to be greeted by a smiling young African lady. We exchanged pleasantries but when I mentioned the DPDT switch she gave the African reply, “Eeeeeeish! The boss will be coming soon”

I departed.

My ageing grey hard drive was perplexed, I rebooted with a slug from Toddie in my bakkie and stretched my memory to a past time I had been in this area, when suddenly another electrical wholesaler sprang into my head. It was on Ontdekkers Road about ten minutes away, I steered the bakkie in what I thought was the right direction.

Wrong.

I ended up in the back streets of Albertskroon but facing me was a very large hardware and building depot which sported the huge sign which announced, “Electrical goods!”

Worth a try I thought, and I sauntered inside to be told that they didn’t have a DPDT switch but I should try Kelec Electrical about two kilometres further down Ontdekkers Road.

“Its number is 360 and Ontdekkers is just around the corner.” Said the over-weight salesman. Feeling elated that my navigational skills were still OK  I climbed into my bakkie and headed off to Kelec.

Ten minutes later, and I was clutching the switch that cost 38 Rand, a bargain!

I drove to my abode dumbfounded that it was only half past nine and set to change into my acting-electrician wardrobe.

For me to now go into the intricacies of my use of the angle grinder, drill, pliers and screw drivers, Phillip’s and straight, ferrels and insulation tape would probably bore you, but I do have to mention how I Magyvered the plastic 4 x4 cover plate so that I could insert my DPDT switch and end up with my completed project.

This required the use of my drill with a three-millimetre bit.

I carefully marked, with a black Cokie pen, the cover-plate with the dimensions of the switch and starting in the centre, I drilled out a rectangular hole. This a tedious job as making a rectangular hole with a round drill bit is like a child trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, almost impossible; however, with the use of a Stanley knife blade the task was completed.

The 4 x 4 box on the left houses the DPDT switch and joint-bar for electrical connections, the wires coming out lead to the starter winding and the running winding of the motor, a brown and blue to each winding, and the recycled double-switch on the right, from my scrap box, is the mains switch for the whole set-up, cutting off both the live and neutral wires, which enter the 2 x 4 box on the far right.

The whole operation, on display below, took approximately four hours and after several test runs of the motor making sure it ran correctly in clockwise and anti-clockwise directions.

I felt the need of a bit of back-slapping and self-administered congratulations.

I refilled my Toddie with some Groot-Marico mampoer I had saved from my trip to that Charles Herman Bosman part of South Africa and had a stupendous, well-deserved back-slapping and thirst quenching time!