8 Motor parts and common faults 

By on

Straight forward list of some common motor faults:

  1. Shaft - Imbalance, Misalignment, Wear
  2. Rotor - Imbalance, Rotor Bar Faults, Loose Rotor, Eccentricity
  3. Stator - Stator Looseness, Incorrect Air Gap, Winding Fault
  4. Motor Bearing Housing -Mechanical Looseness, Misalignment
  5. Rolling Element Bearings - Cage, Ball/Roller, Outer and Inner Race Defects Looseness within the bearing
  6. Motor Feet - Structural Looseness/Soft Foot
  7. Base-plate/Foundations - Structural Looseness, Twisted Supports
  8. Motor insulation - Insulation breakdown

 If I've missed any other common faults, please take a bit of time to add them in as a comment below.



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

  1. Rajeevankeeran's avatar Rajeevankeeran says:
    12/28/2011 7:38 AM

    While it may not be a major problem in Low Voltage Motors, bearing damage due to circulating currents needs special mention. With Regards and wishing all a Happy New Year.


Comments are closed for this post:
  • have a question or need help, please use our Questions Section
  • spotted an error or have additional info that you think should be in this post, feel free to Contact Us



Sony Pocket eBook Reader

For the past few years I have reading eBooks on my HTC touch phone. On and off I have debated buying an eReader and recently purchased a Sony PRS-300 ...

Battery Cars A to Z

Battery powered cars are a hot topic and widely debated. The pros, cons, issues and time frames can be talked about endlessly. An article by the Telegraph...

Equipment Verification (to IEC Standards)

One of the requirements to ensuring that everything works is to have equipment selected, manufactured and verified [tested] to IEC standards. Not all equipment...

Getting Started with Patents

If you have a great idea or invent something the last thing you want is someone to steal the idea. One of the things you can do is protect the intellectual...

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...

IEC 61439 Verification Methods

The (relatively new) switchgear and control gear standard, IEC 61439 'Low-voltage switchgear and controlgear assemblies' has three methods which can be...

Welcome back Bottle

‘Kept looking at a card, y’see? Kept looking at it. Welcome back Bottle. Gods below welcome home. The Crippled God A Tale of the Malazan Book of the...

Restricted Earth Fault Protection

The windings of many medium and small sized transformers are protected by restricted earth fault (REF) systems. The illustration shows the principal of...

IEEE Winds of Change

IEEE TV has a part series of videos on wind power and it's implication. For a really good overview to the technologies and issues around wind power, these...

Are We Losing Professional Integrity

I have been thinking recently that there appears to be less professional integrity around than when I first started my career in electrical 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