Larger motor for less heat?

I'm building a machine which will use a stepper motor in an enclosed plastic chamber. So far, I have used a pretty standard NEMA 17 and DRV8825 driver, but even in open air it's gotten a bit hot. To avoid this, I'm considering using a NEMA 23 motor with the same amout of current. The theory is that with thicker wires, it will have less resistance, and will therefore generate less heat, even at the same torque and speed. Does that sound right? If not, how else can I reduce heat generated?

Are you sure your current is set optimally? If not use this to help you:

[www.youtube.com]

I have spent some time, not a huge amount, tuning the current. I do hope to improve that. Either way, though, it's running in a closed plastic chamber. It'll get hot even at its ideal current level.

How hot is hot? Can you still touch the motor or is it giving you blisters? Stepper motors can get pretty hot and still work just fine. Just as long as the insulation in them is not damaged you are fine, so for saftey let's say they should stay <60-70°C. That will be still pretty hot to the touch.
Many motors might be able to go beyond that, but keep in mind that if you mount them in printed parts that those will become soft with higher temperatures.

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[www.bonkers.de]
[merlin-hotend.de]
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How long are your motors? Other things being equal, longer motors need less current and produce less heat for the same torque.

Power dissipation in the motors is proportional to the square of current, so turning the current down a little makes a big difference to the temperature rise.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

To answer the question: No it won´t make much difference, because you are still stuck with 12V.
The bigger mass and surface may help to keep it cooler.
But like the others already said: How hot is hot?

-Olaf

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o_lampe
The bigger mass and surface may help to keep it cooler.

No, they'll just take longer to heat up. And cool down.