How Did DC Motors Be Used In Electric Hoists, Reels And Winches?

It has been many decades since DC motors have been utilized in electric hoists like crane motor, reels and winches in the construction, trucking and milling/metal forming industries, among others. While the type, configuration and size of the motors is application dependent, in general, permanent magnet, explosion proof and wound field motor are used in these applications.

Permanent Magnet DC Motors

Permanent magnet DC motors (PMDC) are used in hose reels for fire trucks, fuel delivery trucks and lawn care utility vehicles, as well as stage and marine winches.

For battery-powered and low-torque applications up to  HP, permanent magnet DC (PMDC) motors are commonly used for hoisting, hose reeling and winching operations. 

Explosion proof DC motors

Explosion proof DC motors are used in hazardous environments and in applications that include hose-retracting reels in airport fueling operations, crane motor, and motor-driven cable reels.

Wound Field DC Motors

Wound field DC motors (series, shunt or compound) are used in industrial environments for coil feeding reels in the milling/metal forming, crane motor, motor-driven cable reels, and elevator hoist motors above this range and up to several hundred horsepower (HP), in both the standard and explosion proof types.

Wound field DC motors in variable speed applications where a rectified DC or Silicon Controlled Rectifier (SCR) controller is used, the DC motor will be SCR rated.

They are typically used in coil winding (reel drives) in the milling/metal forming industry, crane/elevator hoists, winches and motor-driven cable reels. When crane motor used in hoist applications, these crane motors will be rated for crane duty.

Motor-driven cable reels are used in a wide variety of crane, material handling, and milling equipment including shore container cranes, pallet loaders, shuttle conveyors, transfer cars, among others. It should be noted that the type of motor used in cable reels depends on the application and can be an AC or DC motor. 

Coil feeding equipment in the milling/metal forming industry use wound field DC motors in reel drives to unwind (pay off) metal coil reels and rewind (take up) the coil reels after the milling/metal forming operation has been performed. In the past, the speed of unwind/rewind motors was manually adjusted via an air clutch. This method caused more wear and tear on the machinery and increased energy costs.