Salient Pole Motor

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Original poster: "Marry Krutsch by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <u236-at-earthlink-dot-net>

Hi Everyone.

	It's me again.  Today I bought a surplus 3/4 HP, 3450 RPM, capacitor
start  motor, with the intent of converting it to synchronous unit.  I
ground the flats 180 degrees apart, and larger than I needed to, then
tested the thing.  With no load, it appears to phase lock, but when I
put any significant finger pressure on the shaft, it seems to come out
of sync.  I used a car timing light for the test, using the AC line into
the motor as the trigger.

My questions are:

1. Was using the timing light a problem?  I thought that since they are
designed to trigger on a fast rise ignition pulse, smooth AC might make
it trigger erraticly.  The flash from the light was not terribly smooth,
varying in brightness, and (possibly) frequency.  I powered the timing
light with a car battery, BTW (the way you're supposed to :-))

2. What else could I use to more accurately tell if my motor works? 
Would a light dimmer with a capacitor (ignition coil driver style) and
xenon flash bulb work?

Thanks,
Winston