pump for a water well

[pushrod]

just a bit of idle curiousity - was on holiday in a property with a deep water well and someone had put a rather large 50 micro farad capacitor across its controlling switch, it was just dangling there on the outside of the on off control. Was that for power factor correction? Do motors not have the correction capacitors built in to them? I thought the capacitor would have been physically close to the motor if it was for pf purpose. Any light shed on my ignorance greatly appreciated.
cheers.

 

[mikejashley]

Sounds to me like a CSIR system (capacitor start induction run) or am I getting the wrong end of the stick

 

[johnboy6083]

single phase pumps almost always have a capacitor on them to create an artificial 2nd phase, so that the motor will start. some motors then switch this cap out by centrifugal switch, others carry on running using the cap

 

[pushrod]

It is a single phase supply but aren't the capacitors for producing a second out of phase field to start the motor supposed to be physically close to the motor, this one must have been 40M away, plus it was as big as a small fist. The box lying around for the pump (if it was the one down the well) was only 250Watt. All seemed a bit odd to me