Notes

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.

, ,

More interesting Notes:
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

View 1 Comments (old system)

  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
Railway Electrification Voltages

This post is quick introduction and overview to different railway electrification voltages used in answer to a question sent in via email. While there...

Load Flow Study – how they work

A load flow study is the analysis of an electrical network carried out by an electrical engineer. The purpose is to understand how power flows around...

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...

Three Phase Power Simplified

A single phase system is perhaps the most common type of system most people are familiar with. This is what people have in their homes and what appliances...

Battery Sizing

This article gives an introduction to IEEE 485 method for the selection and calculation of battery capacity.

Operational Amplifier

The fundamental component of any analogue computer is the operational amplifier, or op amp. An operational amplifier (often called an op-amp,) is a high...

Power Transformers - An Introduction

One of the fundamental requirements of an alternating current distribution systems it to have the ability to change the magnitude of voltages.  It is more...

Maxwell's Equations - Introduction

Maxwell's Equations are a set of fundamental relationships, which govern how electric and magnetic fields interact. The equations explain how these fields...

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 ...

Why is electricity so hard to understand?

It's been a busy few months on different projects or busy couple of decades depending on how I look at it. I can say that on the odd (frequent) occasion...

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. 

Footer
(click here to extend)
Copyright (c) 2026 myElectrical