Typically when you place a thermal protector or thermal sensor, you assume you are NOT on one of those hot spots and that your highest winding temperature is 5-10 C higher than what your sensor tells you. You can get hotspots on the windings and you generally won't know where those hotspots are located. Raise the temperature high enough and it might fail in 2 hours or 1 hour or 10 seconds.Īssuming you can figure out a temperature, also keep in mind that motors don't heat up evenly. The wire will eventually fail at all these temperatures but the real question is when. And you could raise it another 10 degrees to 120 C and it still won't burn up right away. In addition to these special wires, this product group includes round and. The photo of a drone motor shown above gives us perspective of how much copper goes into the motor, and why material weight is important to increase the efficiency of the motor.
You could raise the temperature to 110 C and the wire won't burn up right away. These are conductors of copper and aluminum wound with tapes of insulating materials. For most motors like the one shown below, we use copper with a very thin enamel coating and tightly wrap the wire to create the winding that will build the electromagnetic field to drive the motor. That 20,000 hour temperature is used to rate the wire insulation.īut let's say the 20,000 hour temperature is 100 C. They measure the time in hours, plot the 3 points and then extrapolate the 3 points to the 20,000 hour temperature. They do this on 3 samples with 3 voltage and therefore 3 different temperatures. When wire manufacturers rate their wire, it is based off of an accelerated test where they apply a voltage in order heat up the wire.
If you can determine the thermal class of the motor, then that will be the minimum that the magnet wire will be rated.Įven if you can figure out the rated temperature, that won't be the temperature that it burns up. As part of the Essex group you can be confident that you are dealing with the world's largest manufacturer of enamelled copper wire (magnet wire). A, B, F, and H are the most popular insulation classes and have rated temperatures of 105 C, 130 C, 155 C, and 180 C, respectively. Enamelled copper wire (also known as magnet wire) is the key component in the motor and transformer manufacture and repair industry.
#MOTOR WINDING COPPER WIRE CODE#
It might be an actual temperature like "180 C" or it could be a letter code like A, B, F or H. Your best bet is to look at the nameplate of the motor and look for an insulation class. You won't be able to tell what kind of insulation the magnet wire has by looking at it. They can be rated for anywhere between 90 C and 240 C. As others have said, different types of magnet wire have different temperature classes of insulation.