Giraud Trimmer Mod

[pro-nra]

I bought my Giraud trimmer couple of months ago. The moment I unpacked it I was immediately awestruck with a quality well built machine. It works really well and can trim hundreds of cases effortlessly in an hour. I love my Giraud trimmer.

However a couple of things I noticed about the trimmer that did not match the quality of the rest of the machine. So I went about improving and finishing the job Giraud missed in its original design.

The following are areas I thought could be improved:
1) The capacitor was just sitting on top of the motor held by a single bolt. It looked like they forgot about the capacitor when designing the trimmer and installed it as an afterthought.
2) In my opinion, there was too much slack in the yellow wires from the motor to the capacitor. In addition, hole the motor where the wires goes in did not have any rubber grommet to protect the wires from chafing causing electrical short and potential fire or shock to the user.
3) The electrical box where all the wires are connected and where the switch is mounted was made out of flimsy thin aluminum sheet. Just don't match the rest of the rugged trimmer. Again, just like the capacitor, it looked like they forgot about it during the design phase and was installed as an afterthought.

So this is what I've done and cost less than $20 in parts. What do you all think?

This is pic from Giraud website. As you can see, the capacitor is sitting on top of the motor with the yellow wires just hanging down unprotected.


The capacitor moved and the slack on yellow wires tightened.


The yellow wires now encased inside a thick surgical rubber tube going into the motor case. Chafing of the wires and potential fire and shock to the user drastically reduced or eliminated.


inside view of the electrical box where the capacitor is now housed.


I relocated the switch from the top of the box to the front for easy access and a natural up for on and down for off just like the switches in our home lighting. In addition, I added an authentic aircraft toggle switch cover for the added "bling".


This is where the capacitor was mounted by Giraud and you can still see the stud.


Final assembly with the electrical box cover installed. Much cleaner than when it came from the factory don't you think?

[morrow]

You did a wonderful job. Can you share your parts list/numbers/where to buy/etc? The capacitor position bothers me on my Giraud trimmer as well.

[pro-nra]

Thanks for the kind words. Yes my biggest complaint was the out of place capacitor.

The hardest parts for me to source was finding a suitable box. I found this one on eBay for $14.25 shipped here: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Aluminum-Box...item4cfb83afdc The Aircraft switch cover and surgical rubber hose are left over parts from past projects both I bought from eBay as well. If you need some hoses let me know and I'll send you some.

[Dark Mod]

Absolutley Brilliant! It always blows my mind when some member here with engineering or elictrical skills improves upon the design of a manufacturer. I dont have a Giraud but if i bought one i would want to do these modifications as well.

Its a super small niche, but maybe you could package all the necessary parts with an instruction booklet and sell it to Giraud owners for a small profit.

[ruggyh]

Great job -- word of caution --surgical rubber tubing is not listed for this use (as electical conduit) liabilty issue if you market it.

[Pthfndr]

Very pretty.

FWIW, I bought one of Doug's machine the first year he came out with them over 10 years ago. Mine does not even have the belt enclosure.

I figure I've trimmed well over 100,000 cases in that time. It's still going strong in unmodified form. Even has the original drive belt.

[pro-nra]

Great job -- word of caution --surgical rubber tubing is not listed for this use (as electical conduit) liabilty issue if you market it.

Agree. However, I have no intention to market it. I figured the surgical rubber tubing is a vast improvement over the non existent conduit from the factory. I just could not figure out why the left this part poorly designed.

Very pretty.

FWIW, I bought one of Doug's machine the first year he came out with them over 10 years ago. Mine does not even have the belt enclosure.

I figure I've trimmed well over 100,000 cases in that time. It's still going strong in unmodified form. Even has the original drive belt.

Wow you've trimmed 100K cases? I'm sure it would have ran forever without any issues but I like the new cleaner look and that unprotected yellow wires going to the motor from the capacitor and the placement of the capacitor itself bothered me.