One of the most important parts of a drone is its motors. Drone motors can be prone to overheating even with conservative flying. However, drone motor heating is normal, because they are usually put under a lot of stress when flying. But there might be some repercussions if the heat is in excess. Several problems arise when the motors of a drone overheat. The major issues include de-syncing of motors, loss of magnetic strength, hot frames, damaged windings, as well as drone motor failure in extreme cases.
What is motor overheating?
When your motor doesn’t have the right voltage support, it needs to work harder to perform, which causes parts to overheat. Increases in the temperature of an electric motor reduce its lifespan. The winding insulation deteriorates, using bigger size propellers than motor manufacturer’s recommendation or running motor in hot environment, and the bearings may also deteriorate. The standard current tests most load levels, but overvoltage may still be an issue.
What kind of damage does the overheating of the motor cause to the drone?
Damaged motor windings: Drone motors are made with copper wires wrapped around a soft iron magnetic core. Windings form a magnetic field that is controlled by an electronic speed controller. The magnetic field interacts with the permanent magnets thus allowing the rotation of the motors powering the propellers and giving lift to the drone.
Desyncing motors: Overheating of a drone motor can cause desyncing. This takes place when a motor stalls or fails to spin at the same speed as the other motors. This might happen even when the motor signal ascends to the maximum. Desyncing can cause your drone to fall out of the sky or operate uncontrollably.
Loss of magnetic strength: Drone motors consist of magnets that lose their magnetic field strength when overheated. The magnets play a significant role in creating a force that helps the motors to spin
Hot frame: An overheated drone will cause the drone frame to become hot during or after a flight. The heat doesn’t have to be high to burn you, but if you touch a part of the drone’s frame after landing and it feels hot, all is not well with the drone motor. This is because the frame of a drone is conductive and therefore if there is some heat coming from the drone motor, it will heat up.
Drone motor failure: This is the last problem that any drone owner would wish to encounter. Unfortunately, overheating can cause the drone motor to fail completely. If this occurs when your drone is flying, it will inevitably lose its stability and crash unless there is an emergency control plan.