Ever use Marathon motors?

[OEMsparky]

Has anyone ever used Marathon motors? I have not ever used them but they have a smaller/cheaper 1/3hp inverter duty motor than other major manufacturers...let me know if you have any positive or negative feedback.

thanks.

 

[jOmega]

I've used them for over 15 years in all kinds of applications supplied from inverter power.

However, since they were purchased by Regal-Beloit Corp., their quality and reliability seem to have degraded somewhat from what it was when they were a privately held company.

Based upon others competing in that market, I'd still go with a Marathon product as a first consideration.

That's my opinion, based upon feedback from users in various industries.

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[gcaudill]

We use hundreds of Marathon motors. We are particulary pleased with the inverter rated BlackMax line. I would highly recommend Marathon.

 

[PUMPDESIGNER]

We have not used any Marathon in the hp range you are looking at.

We have used hundreds of JP and JM frame Marathon motors over the past 15-20 years, 5hp through 30 hp.

Our experience on these motors is bad, quite a lot of failures within 1 year, more than any other manufacturer.

Every motor repair shop we have asked do not think they are worth much, their overall opinion is cheap construction.

But like many large companies, they could be great in one area, bad in another area.

We have a standing order at all pump manufacturers to never ship anything with Marathon on it.

Baldor seems to be at the top of the heap on these motors as far as we are concerned.

PUMPDESIGNER

 

[jbartos]

Suggestion to the original posting: Another way to go about your concerns pertaining to a product quality is to seek reliability parameters for the selected product, e.g. Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF), Mean Time To Repair (MTTR), Mean Time To Failure (MTTF), Mean Time To Diagnosis (MTTD), Life-Cycle or Life Expectancy, etc.

 

[PUMPDESIGNER]

jbartos,

You are of course correct as usual.
I would like to find that information for sure.

One difficulty though is that motors are affected very much by the application: pump, belt drive, gear drive, and even different kinds of pumps, etc.

A lesser quality motor might do very well in one industry, providing excellent value with sufficient quality or just the right features.
In another industry that same exact motor might be terrible.

In many cases this comes down to bearings, bearing housings, shaft stiffness (L3D4), etc.

PUMPDESIGNER

 

[jbartos]

Comment on the previous posting: The reliability parameters are engineered and designed to grade product based on off the shelf condition. E.g. consider the stock car races. Cars are racing on nice flat raceways, not on any sandy beaches or mountain roads. They may or may not even be capable of running there. This means, that the motor comparisons have to be done under conditions or in applications that are within the motor design basis.