TDI Products Parts?

[RustyTools]

I think I’m going to stop reading posts about things that fail. Seems I must have this psychic connection that causes my stuff to follow suit. Maybe I should only read about people that have won the lottery ???

After recently reading about TDI Products failures, and their company-merger, my Power-Reel lost one leg of 115VAC power this morning and the Progressive Dynamics system shut everything down. It said I had normal power coming in on Line 1, but only about 55 volts on Line 2. Investigation showed the drop was within the Reel itself, and that one wiper was barely making contact. I temporarily bypassed the Reel and now everything is back up and running. Sure am glad for the PD system, otherwise I’m sure my coach would have major problems after trying to run on inadequate power!


Anyways, here’s my question(s)… I’m aware that TDI had been bought-out, so I’m reaching out to anyone that has had dealings with the new company (or its suppliers) for repair-parts. How about sources for the brushes/wipers? Anyone have a defunct Power-Reel they’d like to sell?


TIA

[azstork]

I'm kind of in the same boat as you - Last week-end my TDI electric hose reel quit - The motor was running, but no power to the reel. I took it apart and found the small plastic gear on the motor shaft has broken. I found that TDI was bought out by Technical Research Inc, and they are selling a very similar electric hose reel for RV's (also the power cord reels). I sent an email to TRI to see if they have replacement parts for the hose reel and haven't heard back yet. The rest of my hose reel is pristine - I would hate to scrap it for a 50 cent gear!! If I can't get or find a replacement gear I might try some JB Weld. I'll post back or PM you if I hear anything from TRI.

[BeltoneMagoo]

If you don't get results from the new company, for a gea, Google "Boston Gear". They used to make gears for just about anything. All kinds like plastic, brass and steel. Good luck and safe travels!

[RustyTools]

To close the loop here, I finally got the time to do a post-mortem on the reel assembly.

One of the brush-sets (there are 2 brushes for each wire) had been making poor contact on its wiper-ring, resulting in pitting of the ring and causing a high-resistance at that point when current flowed. That resulted in enough heat to deform the brush-holder, and slowly progressed til it allowed its brushes to barely make contact, exacerbating the problem til the brushes finally lifted away from the ring.

I disassembled everything, cleaned the rings and brushes and sanded down the bad brush-holder to (almost) its original shape and put it all together again (Hey! No parts left-over - imagine that!!) and reinstalled the reel in the coach.

We're stationary for the winter, so I did not wire the reel back in-line yet as right now I'm reluctant to trust it again. Maybe when we get back on the road.

BTW, time-constraints prevented me from checking with any electrical shops to see if they could match the brushes up with standard ones. However, my gut-feel is that, like a lot of other stuff in the 'specialty industries', these aren't unique to our application. Probably came off a 1995 Oldsmobile 98 or something like that.

Case in point, I once had to replace the starter in my airplane, to the tune of almost $800 (this was in 1985 dollars). I happened to notice the blue FoMoCo oval on the new box, and eventually traced the 'aviation' starter model to an older-model Ford tractor. Sure, it was painted a different color which made the FAA happy, but still....