[HAM] Alignment of Start Motor. Warning about exposed AC mains

[Kon Zissis]

John Doyle wrote"
>No need to try it. Look at a schematic of a B3/C3. To the immediate
left of 
>the male plug you can see where the two wires go. One wire goes to the
start 
>motor and the other goes to the start switch and the run switch. I 
>understand that the plug is non-polarized but, if the polarity of the
plug 
>is correct, you should have the neutral or grounded conductor going to
the 
>start motor. With the start and run switches in the off position you
should 
>have no voltage.
 
Hi John and everyone.
My understanding is that in the past  the USA  AC mains had the two
conductor system  with one wire being  the  "hot" or active wire and
the other wire being the earth ground. With this  set up  there should
be no live  voltage present at the start motor , the run motor and the
primary winding of the power transformer of the  AO28 when the organ is
switched off  because the other wire is simply the earth ground so
therefore you would not get an electric shock by touching these when the
organ is switched off.
However with the three conductor  AC mains system  which has the "hot"
active wire , the neutral wire and the separate earth ground this
completely changes the situation so that there is always the dangerous
live voltage present at the motors and the AO28 power transformer even
when the organ is switched off.   I expect that this old Hammond wiring
would be condemned and forbidden by the  UL authority , the European
Union authority and the  Australian C-Tick  authority if the Hammonds
were still in production today.
 
Australia has had the three conductor AC mains wiring set up for a very
long time  so therefore I assume that the Hammonds built for  export to
Australia would always have been wired  in the three conductor mode but
unfortunately the  start and run switches were  still single pole
switches thus switching  off only one wire of the two live AC wires and
allowing the other live AC voltage to always be present even when the
organ is switched off.
 
Another thing that I am curious about is the fact that the start and run
switches in my 1962 C3 switch the neutral wire on and off whilst the
active wire is always "on'. Because the earth ground is separate from
the active and neutral wires , the polarity of the active and neutral
wires does not really matter because it is Alternating Current
electricity but even so I would assume that the normal convention would
be that the active wire is switched  on or off instead of the neutral
wire . 
 
All the best.
Kon