hot steppers

Hi. I got a full control circuit working today, driving one of my steppers (nema 23) with a version1.2 stepper card. I noticed that the motor started to warm very quickly, even after adjusting the current with the trimpot. Is this normal?

Cooler is better in terms of long stepper life, but as long as you can still touch the steppers (roughly 80 deg C), it should be fine. My Z axis stepper is turned up a bit more than the others to deal with friction, and it runs around 70 deg for months at a time.

Wade

I noticed this on my repstraps I rewired the stepper controllers to make use of the enable pin I blogged the details here.

[repstrapbertha.blogspot.com]

This only stops them heating up when they are not moving.

To keep them cool when moving you could pop a small plastic fan blade on unused second drive shaft maybe an old CPU fan blade would do.

Mine seem ok with the first fix using the stepper enable pin.

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Bodge It [reprap.org]
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BIQ Sanguinololu mounting	BIQ standalone Sanguinololu or Ramps mounting	Print It Stick It Cut it

My rep strap: [repstrapbertha.blogspot.com]

Buy the bits from B&Q pipestrap [diyrepstrap.blogspot.com]
How to Build a Darwin without any Rep Rap Parts [repstrapdarwin.blogspot.com]
Web Site [www.takeaway3dtech.com]

Just a follow up, I had the same thing happen to me today when playing with the hacked scanners I have, I found that by tweaking the current down to a low level without losing steps or torque made a huge difference, ie my motors were running so hot that they were beyond touch, now they are lovely and cool, and no noticeable loss in torque

Torque is directly proportional to current. Temperature rise is proportional to current squared, which is why you can get a big drop in temperature for a more modest drop in torque.

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[www.hydraraptor.blogspot.com]