Electric Motors 

By on

Electrical motors are one of the most common items of electrical equipment in service today.  From toys and household appliances to the largest machines on the planet electric motors are used.  Motors as the single biggest users are estimated to account for between 43 and 46% of total global electricity use[1].

Given the widespread use of motors, it is not surprising that many of the posts on myElectrical deal with this topic.  This note is a collection of links to many of our motor notes and a few external resources.  I’ll try and return to the page every now and again to update it with any new notes which are added to the site.

Internal (myElectrical) Links

Induction Motor Calculator Tool – does motor calculations and provided a formulae reference

Motor Starting Time Tool - calculate the approximate starting time for asynchronous motors

Understanding electric motor insulation & temperature - in easy to understand form

How to Calculate Motor Starting Time Post – post which explains how to do this

Understanding Motor Duty Rating Post – explains IEC duty ratings

8 Motor parts and common faults Post – list of common motor faults

Motor Starting – Introduction – introduction to motor starting

Other Notes Articles

The internal links were last updated June 2015.  If your reading this note later, it may be worth using the site search to look for additional information which may have been added.

External Links

The following links are external to myElectrical and provided for reference only.

What is an electric motor? –  find the answer on answers.com

Basic motor theory -  ac motor, dc motor and generator theory

Electric Motor – Wikipedia's article on electric motors in general

AC motor – Wikipedia’s article (types of motor, history and some theory)

AC Industrial Electric Motors – RS datasheet (pdf download)

Two Speed Motors – a primer on two speed motors (motorsandrives.com)



Steven McFadyen's avatar Steven McFadyen

Steven has over twenty five years experience working on some of the largest construction projects. He has a deep technical understanding of electrical engineering and is keen to share this knowledge. About the author

myElectrical Engineering

comments powered by Disqus



Paths of Flight

GE have put together a time-lapse video shown flight take-off and landings at some airports. An interesting view:

Random Numbers

Using laser optical pulses the random number generator utilizes the time between arrival of random photos to generate the numbers, ensuring true accuracy...

Medium Voltage Switchgear Room Design Guide

Many medium voltage (MV) indoor switchgear rooms  exist worldwide. The complexity of these rooms varies considerably depending on location, function and...

Network Theory – Introduction and Review

In electrical engineering, Network Theory is the study of how to solve circuit problems. By analyzing circuits, the engineer looks to determine the various...

Lightning Protection and Earth Electrode Resistance

Most installations involve some form of lightning protection system which is connected to an earth electrode.  The function of the earth electrode is to...

Maximum Demand for Buildings

Estimating maximum demand is a topic frequently discussed. Working out how much power to allow for a building can be very subjective . Allowing too much...

DC Motor Operation

Coils of wire on the rotor carry a d.c. current which generates a magnetic field. A stator magnetic field is created using either permanent magnets or...

What is LED?

Light Emitting Diodes (LED ) are increasing gaining favour in both the domestic and commercial sectors; due to their efficiency, sustainability and durability...

The dc resistance of conductors

This is the first of two posts on the resistance of conductors. In the next post I will look at the ac resistance, including skin effect and we deal with...

110 or 230 Volts

I've been considering a blog on the 110 or 230 Volt issue for a while.  While browsing the Internet I came across a great summary by Borat over at  engineering...

Have some knowledge to share

If you have some expert knowledge or experience, why not consider sharing this with our community.  

By writing an electrical note, you will be educating our users and at the same time promoting your expertise within the engineering community.

To get started and understand our policy, you can read our How to Write an Electrical Note