Motors

An electric motor uses electrical energy to produce mechanical energy. The reverse process, that of using mechanical energy to produce electrical energy, is accomplished by a generator or dynamo. more...

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Traction motors used on locomotives often perform both tasks if the locomotive is equipped with dynamic brakes. Electric motors are found in household appliances such as fans, refrigerators, washing machines, pool pumps, floor vacuums, and fan-forced ovens.

History and development

The principle of conversion of electrical energy into mechanical energy by electromagnetic means was demonstrated by the British scientist Michael Faraday in 1821 and consisted of a free-hanging wire dipping into a pool of mercury. A permanent magnet was placed in the middle of the pool of mercury. When a current was passed through the wire, the wire rotated around the magnet, showing that the current gave rise to a circular magnetic field around the wire. This motor is often demonstrated in school physics classes, but brine (salt water) is sometimes used in place of the toxic mercury. This is the simplest form of a class of electric motors called homopolar motors. A later refinement is the Barlow's Wheel. These were demonstration devices, unsuited to practical applications due to limited power.

The first commutator-type direct-current electric motor capable of a practical application was invented by the British scientist William Sturgeon in 1832. Following Sturgeon's work, a commutator-type direct-current electric motor made with the intention of commercial use was built by the American Thomas Davenport and patented in 1837. Although several of these motors were built and used to operate equipment such as a printing press, due to the high cost of primary battery power, the motors were commercially unsuccessful and Davenport went bankrupt. Several inventors followed Sturgeon in the development of DC motors but all encountered the same cost issues with primary battery power. No electricity distribution had been developed at the time. Like Sturgeon's motor, there was no practical commercial market for these motors.

The modern DC motor was invented by accident in 1873, when Zénobe Gramme connected the dynamo he had invented to a second similar unit, driving it as a motor. The Gramme machine was the first electric motor that was successful in the industry.

In 1888 Nikola Tesla invented the first practicable AC motor and with it the polyphase power transmission system. Tesla continued his work on the AC motor in the years to follow at the Westinghouse company.

Categorisation of electric motors

The classic division of electric motors has been that of DC types vs AC types. This is more a de facto convention, rather than a rigid distinction. For example, many classic DC motors run happily on AC power.

Read more at Wikipedia.org