A friend (in USA) with a 220v, 1-phase horizontal bandsaw in his home machine shop wants to replace the 1/4 hp motor with 1/2 hp and rewire with an auto-off switch (when the blade cuts through the metal).
I always default to using a 3-wire control with contactor, but he asks the logical question: "Why?"
Other than the "If the power fails while cutting" answer (which he says seems of limited additional value on a saw with auto-stop feature) I wasn't very convincing.
What are the arguments for using a contactor as opposed to a simple on-off switch of equivalent rating?
Thanks.