Can Ceiling Fan Motors Be Repaired

Non long agone, I had a ceiling fan end spinning and get-go making an e'er so slight buzzing noise. I thought maybe it was as a issue of switching the rotation direction of the fan. Switching it back didn't change anything either. I simply shut off the fan motor to end the buzzing and pondered nearly how much I dread changing ceiling fans especially since the fan in the living room match this failed dining room fan. I really wanted to repair this Hampton Bay Ceiling fan rather than replace it.

Later on doing a little Cyberspace research, searching "repair ceiling fan", I got a lot of cruft and useless information. Side by side I tried to narrow it down to "ceiling fan not spinning" and "replace ceiling fan motor" to only observe more non-solutions. Then I stumbled upon this site that identified the capacitor every bit a possible crusade of failure.

Then I did nil about it until I was gifted a broken fan.

I had no thought if this donor fan had a compatible capacitor not only it was worth a try. I started out by pulling apart the ceiling fan.

I removed the bulbs, shades so the 3 screws that hold the low-cal kit in identify. Upon removing the capacitor and it was very obvious that the capacitor had failed equally it had very prominent jutting on ii sides of information technology.

I took note that this is a 280V iv.5µF ten 6µF x 5µF capacitor and decided to do some searching on the web for prices, because, I wasn't sure how much such a matter would cost. I'chiliad sure you can imagine my happy surprise when I discovered that the donor fan had the exact aforementioned capacitor my ceiling fan.

This was enough for me to commit fully the project. I removed the onetime capacitor, marked the switch side gray wire striped the wire ends to prepare it for the donor capacitor. The balance of the wires were in the exact same configuration as the original so wiring this in was lilliputian.

I used 16-xiv AWG Vinyl Insulated Barrel Splice and prepared the capacitor to be installed in the ceiling fan. I tagged the gray leg that went to the switch on the donor and checked to see information technology was the same leg on the crippled unit.

I realized that I wasn't sure if the motor was damaged or not past the failed capacitor but in that location was no appreciable risk in trying. After crimping the capacitor into the fan, I flipped the switch and pulled the chain to accept the desired issue of spinning blades.

I stopped, looked at my success and had a moment of smiling from ear to ear. As much as I liked this look of the light kit hanging downwards from the fan. I didn't have any interest in bumping my head into it.

Since the shades were off, I took this as an opportunity to hand wash the calorie-free shades, dust the blades and body to shine the affair up before completing its reassembly.

Final Thoughts

I get a lot of satisfaction out of fixing things. I phone call this project a corking success. No coin out of pocket and only just over an hr of time invested. How much money did I salve? A 52-Inch, 5-blade fan of similar design is well-nigh $80 simply to have matching fans, I would have had to purchase two fans and spend the fourth dimension removing and installing the new fans. Now, I get to keep my 6 twelvemonth old fans going just a scrap longer and I saved quite a chip of fourth dimension as well. Now, I merely have to dispose of the remains of the donor fan in an ecologically sound manner.

Commodity Amendment (24 Jul 2020): I was contacted by Martha Chapman, the Writer / Owner of Fan Enthusiast at TopWindowFans for some additional resources that may be of help for other troubleshooting or if yous are looking for a new ceiling fan. Reading it over, it is chock-total of useful information: