# vfds.com



## SCR (Mar 24, 2019)

Hi. Looking for info on Galt vfds. Are they any good? They seem to be priced quite economically on vfds.com. How are they compared to Yaskawa and schneider?

Also wondering about vfds.com. Has anybody had any experience with this store? I can't seem to find any reviews online. Thanks for any info.


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## JRaef (Mar 23, 2009)

Galt is not actually a company, they are a brand name for a company based in Salt Lake City called Energy Management Co. EMC has been around a long time as a large distributor for drives, mainly Mitsubishi, but they diversified a while ago by setting up related company names under the same roof, kind of like a "shell game". They also got into on-line sales and owns the website called "VFDs.com". So EMC, Galt Electric and VFDs.com are all one and the same.

I believe what they did was that EMC bought a small motor shop in Pomona, CA called "GP Electric" (link, showing the same address as Galt Electric) who I believe was importing cheap no-name Chinese VFDs. Then what it appears they have done is to pay get them UL listed under the Galt name (the Chinese never bother with that, too expensive) and re-write the terrible "Chinglish" instruction manuals those things typically come with. If you look at the manual, you can tell because they cut and pasted some of the graphics from the small format the Chinese use, so they came out blurry when blown up (I used to create manuals for Taiwanese VFDs, had the same issue).

So are they any good? Probably not, because why would a large distributor of quality VFDs like Mitsubishi bother to set up a shell company ion a different state, import a competitive product and spend the money to get it UL listed unless they can make a LOT of money based on how cheap they get them from China? So if they are that cheap then, there is always a reason...


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## Wirenuting (Sep 12, 2010)

Welcome to ET.

Please take the time to finish filling out your profile.


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## frenchelectrican (Mar 15, 2007)

SCR said:


> Hi. Looking for info on Galt vfds. Are they any good? They seem to be priced quite economically on vfds.com. How are they compared to Yaskawa and schneider?
> 
> Also wondering about vfds.com. Has anybody had any experience with this store? I can't seem to find any reviews online. Thanks for any info.


Welcome to the fourm .,

Will you please fill your profile as it will be on the control panel and go from there.


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## SCR (Mar 24, 2019)

Ok, well that bursts my Galt bubble.
I also noticed that hardly any of the online stores in USA carry 600v vfds, though it is the most popular voltage here in Saskatchewan. Is there a particular reason for this? Even a huge store like Automation Direct does not carry anything 600v.


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## JRaef (Mar 23, 2009)

SCR said:


> Ok, well that bursts my Galt bubble.
> I also noticed that hardly any of the online stores in USA carry 600v vfds, though it is the most popular voltage here in Saskatchewan. Is there a particular reason for this? Even a huge store like Automation Direct does not carry anything 600v.


 In the world of power transistors, making them to survive for a 600VAC system is a lot more difficult than for 480V or below. So if you think about a production line, every transistor coming off of the line is tested for an operating voltage level and in the testing process if they fail, they become scrap; it's actually DC voltages but I'll use the equivalent AC RMS voltages to make it clearer. 

To fill the needs for 240V class drives, virtually all of those transistor modules tested will pass and get shipped. Once you fill those orders, you start on the orders for 380-480V. For 480V, less than half of them will pass. When you finish filling those orders, you start testing for 600-690V and for those, _less than 10%_ will pass. So from a cost per unit basis, 90 out of 100 transistor modules tested for 600-690V will end up in the garbage can as waste product. That means the cost to manufacture them is essentially 10x the cost to make a 240V rated transistor module. Yet when people buy drives, they EXPECT that because the current goes down at 600V, they should actually pay LESS for them on a per HP basis. 

So in a nutshell, there is almost no profit in making and selling 600V rated drives, unless you have a name and reputation to uphold in a market and not having them means you are out. So from a manufacturing and marketing standpoint, smaller mfrs that focus on cheap drives in volume just don't want to invest in making 600V rated drives. The big players with more to lose by NOT being able to serve your market are forced to, and to take it in the shorts for those drives (in a relative sense... nobody actually loses money on VFDs).


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## paulengr (Oct 8, 2017)

JRaef said:


> In the world of power transistors, making them to survive for a 600VAC system is a lot more difficult than for 480V or below. So if you think about a production line, every transistor coming off of the line is tested for an operating voltage level and in the testing process if they fail, they become scrap; it's actually DC voltages but I'll use the equivalent AC RMS voltages to make it clearer.
> 
> To fill the needs for 240V class drives, virtually all of those transistor modules tested will pass and get shipped. Once you fill those orders, you start on the orders for 380-480V. For 480V, less than half of them will pass. When you finish filling those orders, you start testing for 600-690V and for those, _less than 10%_ will pass. So from a cost per unit basis, 90 out of 100 transistor modules tested for 600-690V will end up in the garbage can as waste product. That means the cost to manufacture them is essentially 10x the cost to make a 240V rated transistor module. Yet when people buy drives, they EXPECT that because the current goes down at 600V, they should actually pay LESS for them on a per HP basis.
> 
> So in a nutshell, there is almost no profit in making and selling 600V rated drives, unless you have a name and reputation to uphold in a market and not having them means you are out. So from a manufacturing and marketing standpoint, smaller mfrs that focus on cheap drives in volume just don't want to invest in making 600V rated drives. The big players with more to lose by NOT being able to serve your market are forced to, and to take it in the shorts for those drives (in a relative sense... nobody actually loses money on VFDs).



Hate to break the news to you but these days run of the mill IGBTs are 1000 V, giving you up to 690 VAC maximum (DC bus voltage is 145% of AC RMS). Under about 20 HP granted you can switch to cheaper MOSFETs. The next grade up is 3300 V HVIGBTs which are roughly 5 times more expensive.


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## oliquir (Jan 13, 2011)

SCR said:


> Ok, well that bursts my Galt bubble.
> I also noticed that hardly any of the online stores in USA carry 600v vfds, though it is the most popular voltage here in Saskatchewan. Is there a particular reason for this? Even a huge store like Automation Direct does not carry anything 600v.


 yes AutomationDirect have the gs2 series at 575vac, but those are very basic vfds that are easy to blow

for general use i use the eaton mmx series available through canadian electrical distributors


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## paulengr (Oct 8, 2017)

oliquir said:


> yes AutomationDirect have the gs2 series at 575vac, but those are very basic vfds that are easy to blow
> 
> for general use i use the eaton mmx series available through canadian electrical distributors



575 V is readily available in the States but it’s always special order for everything. Motors are commonly sold as 9 or 12 lead dual voltage 460/230 which is usually also 208 certified which covers all the common distribution voltages. 575 is oddball and 690 V even more so. But in Canada 600/575V systems are very common. In fact if we order a 575 V motor quite often it ships out of a Canadian warehouse. I don’t know anyone there but I’m sure AD is doing the same thing. You can probably call and special order it. Looking at UL there is no AD listing so their GS drives are just private labels.


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## micromind (Aug 11, 2007)

Sort of an oddball sidenote here.....a 12 lead 230/460 motor can be connected for 575.


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## paulengr (Oct 8, 2017)

micromind said:


> Sort of an oddball sidenote here.....a 12 lead 230/460 motor can be connected for 575.



How would you do that? 12 lead gives you series or parallel, or star. So series delta wired gives you 460 V high voltage.


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## TedW (Apr 22, 2021)

500V class VFDs have 1600V devices and 600V class VFD have ~ 2200V devices normally. The caps stack 3 in series instead of 2 to get to 1200VDC for 600V (2 for 800VDC doe 500V) and this causes you to need far more caps, increasing size and cost.

It’s not the same IGBTs but the other parts are similar, though in different quantity


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## micromind (Aug 11, 2007)

paulengr said:


> How would you do that? 12 lead gives you series or parallel, or star. So series delta wired gives you 460 V high voltage.


Lol.....after a year and a half........

A 12 lead motor is pretty versatile, it can be connected parallel ∆ or Y as well as series ∆ or Y

It has 6 - 230 volt windings, and can be connected 5 different ways. 

5???? Yes, 5. 

Of course the most common is the parallel or series ∆ and the Y connections are used for starting but there is also a Y-∆ connection. 

This is where 1-4, 2-5 and 3-6 are connected Y and 7-10, 8-11 and 9-12 are ∆. The '575' connections are L1-1, L2-2, L3-3, 4,7,12 are spliced as are 5,8,10 and 6,9,11. 

The result is 1-4, 2-5 and 3-6 are Y while 7-10, 8-11 and 9-12 are ∆. The ∆ connection is looking for 230 volts and the Y wants to see 398. (230X1.73=398). Because the Y is feeding the ∆, the voltages will add so the ideal line voltage will be 628. 

At 628 volts, each winding would see 230 volts. 

If it's a NEMA motor, the minimum would be 565 but the system voltage is actually around 600 so it'd be within spec. 

For O/Ls, you'd use the 460 volt rating since all current is imposed on the Y set of windings. The ∆ set would see 1/2 of their rated current.


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