General Types of Micro Gear Motor

In the process of modern industrialization, the mutual transformation of electrical energy and mechanical energy has become very common and necessary. Gear motor is a device that converts electrical energy into mechanical energy. The gear motor is composed of a motor, gear, and bearings in a housing. It is commonly used in applications that require a high amount of force (torque) at low speed. Nowadays, various kinds of devices are getting smaller in size. In this case, the micro gear motor came into being. Micro gear motor is a gear motor whose diameter is measured in millimeters (small size) and the torque is high due to the adoption of the gearbox. Micro gear motors can be divided into so many different types according to different standards. This passage will introduce several commonly used micro gear motors.

 

Micro DC Gear Motor

A micro DC gear motor is a type of gear motor that takes electrical power through direct current and converts this energy into mechanical rotation. It consists of a micro DC motor and a set of gears (gearbox). DC motor is made up of a stator and a rotator. It uses magnetic fields that occur from the electrical currents generated, which powers the movement of a rotor fixed within the output shaft. The output torque and speed depend upon both the electrical input and the design of the motor.

Micro DC gear motors require a battery power source and are used for precise variable-speed applications such as wheelchairs, hospital beds, lifts and medical tables, power seats, and other automotive applications.

 

Miniature Brushless DC Motor

Since DC motors are generally divided into two types, brushed DC motor and brushless DC motor (BLDC), miniature brushless DC motor is a common type of micro DC gear motor as well. It adopts a brushless DC motor and a set of gears. The BLDC motor is a typical mechatronic product. The brushless motor refers to the motor without brush and commutator (or slip ring), also known as the commutatorless DC motor.  A miniature brushless DC gear motor generally utilizes a permanent magnet as its external rotor. The windings are on the rotor for brush dc gear motors. Things are different for the brushless motor. The windings are on the stator for brushless motors. In addition, it uses three phases of driving coils and a specialized sensor that tracks the rotor position. After tracking the position change of the rotor, the position sensor commutates the current of the stator winding in a certain sequence (that is, detecting the position of the rotor pole relative to the stator winding, and generating a position sensing signal at a certain position, which is processed by the signal conversion circuit to control the power switch circuit.).

Micro brushless DC gear motors have various applications, such as automobiles, tools, smart home, electronic products, industrial robots, smart robots, logistics equipment, medical equipment, industrial control, automation, and aerospace.

 

Micro Planetary Gear Motor

Unlike the previous 2 types of gear motors which are categorized by the motor, the micro planetary gear motor is divided by the gearbox the gear motor adopts. As introduced in the former passage, a gear motor is generally made up of a set of gears, called gearboxes/gearheads, and a motor, which is used to change speed and torque. That’s to say, a micro planetary gear motor indicates a motor with a planetary gearbox/planetary gearheads. Planetary gearheads normally consist of three parts: a sun gear, planet gears, and a ring gear. The sun gear is generally placed in the center, while planet gears orbit around the sun gear and receive torque from it. As for the ring gear, the outer ring gear (refers to the housing below) meshes with planet gears. Planetary gear motors are often used when you need to reduce speed and increase torque heavily in a limited space.

 

Micro Geared Stepper Motor

 

Micro geared stepper motor generally refers to a stepper motor with a gearbox or gearheads. While the brushed DC motor will keep rotating if connected to a DC power supply, the geared stepper motor is not the thing. It will convert the input pulse into a precisely defined increment in the shaft position. The shaft is moved by each pulse with a fixed angle. That means every pulse inputs, the rotator will move a step or rotate at a fixed angle. The rotating speed is proportional to the pulse frequency. Therefore, you can control the rotating speed by changing the frequency of the input pulse, realizing precise positioning. Adding a gearbox to a stepper motor system can improve motor performance by reducing the inertia ratio of the load to the motor, increasing the load torque, and reducing motor oscillation.

 

As the micro gear motor is gaining wider applications, more customization of parameters should be made, like torque, diameter, voltage, speed, etc. ZHAOWEI, as a micro drive system manufacturer, provides a set of custom transmission systems to meet your specific needs.