[Shop-talk] sigh...now the pool PUMP is out

[Randall]

> most excellent. have the capacitor, it is the right size, it fits in the
> housing...and I don't know how to hook it up. the blade terminals on the
> capacitor are not marked, there are just four of them in an 'h' pattern.

Either look closely or check with a meter; the pairs that are closer
together are typically connected.  IOW the capacitor only has two
connections, but each has two terminals for convenience in wiring.

> so...I'm going to just hook it up. I figure the worst that happens is I
> destroy the capacitor, right? I'll just keep buying them until I figure it
> out?

Not likely to hurt the capacitor (AC capacitors don't have polarity so
there's no worry about hooking it up backwards).  If the motor doesn't run,
most likely it will just pop the circuit breaker.  The main thing to watch
for, IMO, is having it run backwards.

However, you might want to chase down where the start switch or relay is and
check that it works.  It should kill the current through the start capacitor
and winding once the motor is up to speed.  If it doesn't, the capacitor
will soon fail again (if the motor doesn't overheat or pop the breaker).

Hopefully there was some sort of automatic overload, since you didn't find a
manual one.  Otherwise, the motor would hum with a bad cap and power
applied.  "No sound" means the main winding wasn't getting power either.

Randall