Advanced Servo Motors ...
PMW Dynamics provide a comprehensive portfolio of advanced PM servo motors deploying both brush and brushless technology each bringing their specific benefits to an application
Remember your choice is not limited to catalogue items as PMW Dynamics have the capability to design and manufacture custom motors optimised to the exact requirement of your application
Industries Served by PMW Dynamics
A diverse range of industries rely on PMW Dynamics to engineer motor solutions design specifically for their demanding needs. Here's some examples ...
NewsMarch 2023
History of Printed Armature Motors
Nick Revels - Application Specialist at PMW
Nick, what’s a pancake motor and how are they used?
We love our technical spec and hope this brief history of the brushed pancake motor will interest your own engineering curiosity
The history of brushed pancake motors and Printed Motor Works stretches back to the 1950′s with the invention of the disc shaped laminated armature made from printed circuit board. The technology was licensed to Printed Motor Works’ predecessor, PML, which started up in Aldershot in 1963. Printed Motor Works is thus the original European manufacturer of brushed pancake motors. The original US manufacturing arm established in the same year was PMI Motion Technologies which later became part of Kollmorgen, now part of Danaher Motion
The printed motor design was quickly adapted so that it could be made from laminated copper discs and was applied extensively as magnetic and paper tape capstan drive servos. The printed motor, or slotted disc servo motor as it was also known, was chosen to run analogue magnetic tape drives because of its very precise speed control as well as wide range of speeds. The motor was then combined with digital optical or magnetic tachometers
Printed Armature Motor
However, thanks to its very fast acceleration capability resulting from a high pulse torque to inertia ratio and the absence of cogging the pancake motor was very quickly identified for a number of other uses in energy, aerospace, automotive, life sciences, medical and general industrial automation applications. The iron-free flat armature motor provides some significant performance advantages especially for motion control applications
Does anyone else remember working in offices as shown in our 1963 picture? Printed motors running analogue magnetic tape drives. It looks surprisingly modern considering it was well over 50 years ago!
Stepping back to the early days of magnetic storage
Want to find out more?
Get in touch