What is the best way to build an electric motor?

Update:27 Mar 2019
Summary:

If you’re trying to help your kid with his homework, th […]

If you’re trying to help your kid with his homework, there are many possibilities to make nice DC motors.

I just made a very simple one in about five minutes, and i’ll try to upload the video for you.

It isn’t the best way but it’s for sure the easiest way to make a DC motor.

To be honest, writing your answer is taking me more time than making the motor and the video.
If your goal is to make money out of motors, that’s a business strategy. You gotta design a very efficient one with competitive cost. You gotta find suppliers, designers, manufacturing plant, warehouse, sales force, workers, investors. The most important, you gotta find customers for your motor!

For our school oriented motor, all you need is a magnet, a batterySpin Motors Suppliers and a small piece of wire of any metal, as long as it is conductive. I took “washer” type magnets, those used to lock kitchen cabinet doors, a AA battery and a piece of copper wire. It is based on the classic “Faraday motor”.

The principle is very simple and its based on the so called “Lorentz force”. Any wire immersed in a transversal magnetic field will be pushed to its side if an electric current circulates through it. We use the right hand rule to demonstrate it, in where the thumb can represent the direction of the magnetic field, the indicator shows the direction of the current along the wire and the middle finger represents the force over the wire.

In my prototype I put some turns on the wire, just to help keeping the balance, but the only part of the wire responsible for the movement is the straight part close to the magnets.

For a schooler science show it works very well, but in practical terms it is totally inefficient.

When I was seven, I made my first DC motor with things I grabbed out of trash cans, such as magnets, wires, batteries, wood and nails. It worked pretty well and I put a tiny propeller to make fun with a fan 🙂

With components got out of a trash can I was awarded a prize at my school’s science show, a couple of years later.