I suppose I moved a little to fast by buying a #9 Lucas Lowboy foot
controller for my Foredom SR. Now that I have it I see that the
Foredom foot controller is hard wired to the motor. Has anyone
switched out the foot controller as I’d like to by either detaching
the Foredom wire from the Foredom foot controller and then hard
wiring it to the Lowboy? I suppose I have 2 other options:
Cut the female plug off the supply wire from the lowboy and hard
wire it into the Foredom motor, or
Buy another grounded male plug, fasten it to end of the supply
wire to the motor and then just plug that into the female plug of
the supply wire coming out of the Lowboy.
Any thoughts or experience would be greatly appreciated.
If your SR works the way I think it does, you can’t.
The Low-Boy is an SCR based foot pedal designed to work with basic
universal AC motors. (Like the old Foredom CC class motors.) They all
have the same standard ‘plug into the wall’ plug.
The current “SR” motors do too, but my memory of the original SRs
was that they used a different motor wiring to increase the low-end
torque. That wiring meant they couldn’t use a ‘normal’ foot pedal.
There were notes about it all through the supply catalogs at the
time. (20ish years ago) Depending on how old your SR is, you may have
one of the ones with a custom foot pedal. The fact that it’s wired
on makes me believe that you do.
One way to check is to pull the foot pedal apart. Check the wiring
going out to the motor. If you have more than three wires, you’re
stuck with it.
(My memory is that the old SR pedal had four lines going to the
motor.) I think the weird ones had a fully cylindrical motor body,
just a little bigger than a CC, rather than the boxy-with-fins style
they’re using now.
Now that I check online, I can’t find any references to the old SRs
and their weird foot pedals. Does anybody else remember all the
details?
The Foredom foot controller should NOT be hard wired to the Foredom
SR motor. Your Foredom SR motor (both old style and new style SR
motor) should have a standard plug that plugs into a Foredom Foot
speed control. The outlet on the Lucas # 9 foot speed control is the
same as the one on the Foredom foot speed control.
I couldn’t help notice that Dennis was having a problem with a
Foredom SR motor and a Lucas #9 Lowboy.
I assume that the SR he was talking about has a special (4 prong)
male plug coming off the motor, and I also assume that the Foredom
foot control has a special (4 prong) female plug to connect to this
male plug, I believe Foredom discontinued this motor with that
special plug.
If this is the case, and you want to use the #9 Lowboy instead, you
will have to cut off the male plug on the motor and replace it with
a standard 3 prong male plug that you can pick up at any local
hardware store. If this is the case, then I suggest that you buy a
good quality plug with a strain relief built into the plug.
The four wires coming off the Foredom motor are Black (hot), White
(neutral), Green (ground), & RED (cut this one off & cap it) you
don’t need it.
When attaching to the New Plug, the Black (hot) gets attached to the
large prong. the White (neutral) gets attached to the smaller prong
& the Green (ground) gets attached to the round prong. and then your
good to go.
You have questions, you can always give me a call at Toll-Free
1-(800)-332-5573 eastern time or email: Lucadent@verizon. net
Thanks to everyone who helped me think about the best way to adapt a #9 Lucas Lowboy foot control to a Foredom SR motor. Mike Zagielski
called me and confirmed that, while it was unusual that the motor
was hardwired to the Foredom pedal, it would be best to disconnect
that wire from the pedal, and put a male connecter on it and plug
into the Low Boy pedal.
Happy New Year to all and thanks to all responsible for making Orchid
the great site that it is.
