Jandy Stealth 2HP Pump JHPU2.0 on its way out; thinking motor replacement.

[morzh]

My 2hp Stealth pump pump has been loud for the 3rd year; the motor gets hot and this year starting from the day I opened the pool the sound is as if it slows down and speeds up. I think it is the motor. I am thinking of replacing it, and the pool companies charge a lot for it. ($900 to $1200 motor; upward of $2300 for the whole thing).
The motor has the label that says "MODEL UST1202". I see them being sold on Amazon for $240 or so. But there are several companies who sell them, and I am not sure they all have the same flange for the same pump. And their shafts'ends look different.

Amazon.com : UST1202

Does anyone have experience with these? Which one is for Jandy Stealth? Does the motor modification code describe it, if it is the same?I have K48M2N110C2, the first one on Amazon where it is readable says the same. And both say A.O. Smith.

How involved is the replacement? (mechanically)
Should I get gaskets along with the motor?

PS. Inyopools.com seems to sell what they call as replacement motors for JHPU pump 2hp, but they look different from mine and have different name, like 56j and not UST1202.

Best

Mike

 

[cowboycasey]

Mike, perfect timing.. Get yourself a VS pump and save paying for electricity..

Call inyo and make sure your motor will accept the V Green VS motor.. I changed over to a 1.65 hp and love it, works great and saves so much money.. see if your pump is closer to 1.65 or 2.7, I think it is closer to 1.65...

Variable Speed Pool Pump Motors - INYOPools.com

Replace your outdated pool pump motor with a variable speed motor which can save you up to 80% on your operational costs - INYOpools.com

www.inyopools.com

 

[morzh]

Casey

Thanks for advice; I was intending to call them today, though have not seen the phone, they gave me chat robot. Is the motor drop-in ? I mean, it should be if marked as 56j. The power as written on mine is 1.56kW which is 2HP. Well, I guess when talking to them I will find out.

Mike

 

[jester4]

I just changed the motor on my steath 1.5hp to a vgreen 1.65 and it works fine using the same impeller. Kept the same wet end.

edit. my motor was 56Y so that means square end. I think 56J is round. Just make sure you buy the right mounting flange and all is good.

 

[morzh]

I cannot take off the impeller. It is frozen badly.
Put some PBBlaster in.

The screw that they show that secures the impeller to the shaft is not being used here, I thought they lost it but it is not in manual either. So I guess the water gets in and does the nasty job. No wonder they discontinued that series.

Anyone has an idea how to best take it off?
The motor had to go, I could barely rotate the shaft.
But I do not have enough grip to rotate the impeller against the wrench on the back of the shaft. CCW, of course.

 

[morzh]

OK, bought a rubber strap wrench.
It came off, if with difficulties.

Now the motor screws. Frozen solid. And idiots who designed it made the screws go in between the motor and the flange of the pump, so no socket will do. Adjustable it is. Not working. Lots of PB Blaster and now we wait.

 

[cowboycasey]

those bolts are a pain....

 

[morzh]

PB Blaster did not do much.
So I ran to Home Depot, bought two 9/16 wrenches and a 1-1/2 foot steel pipe, which I used as a lever to lengthen the wrench.
I used the second wrench as a rolling fulcrum.
I calculated I applied between 1.6 and 2.4 tons of effort to the screws.
For the last screw I used the Strap Wrench as the hold. It worked.

Whew!

PS. I could barely rotate the old motor's shaft. I am amazed it was working.

 

[morzh]

Then there were the 4 screws that held the motor to the pump's bracket. The idiots who designed the pump put the screws such that they are between the flange and the motor, so no socket wrenches.
I tried adjustables....no. I did not have enough force.

PB Blaster did not do much.

So I ran to Home Depot, bought two 9/16 wrenches and a 1-1/2 foot steel pipe, which I used as a lever to lengthen the wrench.
I used the second wrench as a rolling fulcrum.
I calculated I applied between 1.6 and 2.4 tons of effort to the screws.
For the last screw I used the Strap Wrench as the hold. It worked.
The screws were calcified along the whole part of the thread that went into the motor. It was bad.



Whew!

After having a good night sleep:
So, today I was hoping all would go smoothly. Well...jumping ahead, I could say, yes, I finished it and it is working, but smoothly...compared to yesterday, yes.

First of after having rinsed the inside of the mounting bracket (which looked like this after I jumped over the very first hurdle, removing the impeller)




I needed to put it back and then insert 2-part seal; one is ceramic, and the other is a spring type that hoes against it.
After re-attaching the mounting bracket to the motor, and putting the ceramic seal in, I read the manual that says "put some silicon seal around the perimeter of the spring seal and then press it in with your hands". Yeah right. I was about to break my nails and fingers trying to do this. Screwdrivers are bad, there is a graphite part that could be damaged.
So I eventually found two pieces of wood with wedge ends (to fit there) and tapped the seal in with a hammer.
Well, I thought, my woes are over.
I finished the assembly and took the motor mounted to the bracket out.

Not so fast.

I said before, when I took out the motor from the pump, I found some glue residue on the diffuser cone.



So when I went to check out the wet end of the pump and ran my hand around to feel for sand and debris, the cone fell out in my hands. It was a good thing eventually. First it had another O-ring that needed replacement, second, it was smeared with glue residue blobs that would clearly break the seal with the O-ring.
I spent about 40 minutes with s small chisel, trying co clear it off and not to damage the cone in the process.

Then I mounted and connected the motor, sitting in 88 degrees (95 Real Feel with bad humidity) under the sun, primed the pump and turned it off.
It took it a couple of minutes but the water came.

The high pitch is gone. So is RPM up and down sound. Normal muffled pump sound, cannot hear it through the back door, or even with the door open.

Some other pictures.

Old motor before I started.



The bolts that held the motor (which is why I bought the pipe) looked like this. Note the scaling.



Motor face looked like so:



This is the assembled motor to the bracket, ready to be installed to the wet end.





Hope this is it.

 

[Chad1979]

Glad you got it apart and back together. Just from reading your original post about it being loud for last couple of seasons, those bearings in the motor were dying back then. Its a wonder it was running at all this year. Probably got lucky the motor didnt melt down anything.

 

[morzh]

Chad, yeah I got lucky. My pool guy who opens my pool and who, as I was told, built it, said that the pump did not sound right. But other then the sound last year there was nothing else, while this time the RPM were going up and down quite a bit, so I realized I had to do something soon. I cut down on the hours a bit, and moved the operation to early morning and late evening to keep it from extra heat..
I wonder if someone had repaired this pump before. I doubt the glue on the cone and the diffuser was original. If so, the repair was not done right and could be the reason for the motor's demise.