What's the difference between a motor and an engine? (2013)
engineering.mit.edu
engineering.mit.edu
However, at some point since he retired, Estes transitioned to calling them Engine/Motors [2], and now, the primary labelling Estes uses calls them Engines, though Engine/Motor is still printed on the cardboard casing itself. [3]
Interestingly, the Spanish, French and German on the motors still use motor, as Motor, Moteur-Fusee and Raketenmotor, respectively.
Because of that upbringing, I have since treated the words to mean that a motor is something that provides force of motion (thrust or rotation) - it may or may not also be an engine, as in the rocketry examples. An engine is a contraption with moving/interacting parts that uses energy to accomplish some goal - that goal may (F-1, car engine) or may not (cotton gin, search engine) be the propulsion of the contraption itself and what it's attached to.
That said, as a child I made no such distinction, hence the frequent corrections. I am happy to recognize that in common vernacular they are usually synonymous, though it would still sound strange, I think, to call something a 'search motor' (edit: however, see comment by yau8edq12i !) or a 'graphics motor' just as it would be jarring to encounter 'servoengine'.
1: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi...
2: https://www.apogeerockets.com/bmz_cache/f/f8ecac9604d017a5c7...
The notion was that the development of engines, as opposed to simpler motors and mechanical systems, had required a net set of skills that led to a recognizably different discipline. More systematic, more concerned with dynamics and feedbacks, cross-disciplinary to materials and machining techniques, more data driven, more advanced mathematic and analytic techniques in support of these. The sense was simpler mechanical systems were more linear and engines were highly non-linear, and required a different mindset to approach.
I like the distinction and appreciate the different terms.
Automobiles generally have engines, but motor isn't uncommon for (internal combustion) engines there either. Motor car is something I remember my grandfather saying although I guess that's not really used anymore, but motorbike certainly is. So is motorsports. "Blown motor" is a pretty common phrase for an IC engine that has stopped working due to damage.
Engine has some exclusive cases where motor does not substitute. Jet engine and steam engine come to mind.
Second this. In photography, the little electric drive motors inside camera lenses are never called engines, though they definitely do have small moving parts.
Or was it more one-directional, such that engines can be called motors but motors should not be called engines?
A rocket motor has the expansion part of a heat engine in an obvious way. An electric motor produces motion, but isn't an engine.
Both Motor and Engine are generally translated into french as "Moteur"
Then again, we colloquially call both a motorcycle and its engine “motor”.
"engineer" in French is ingénieure (feminine) and ingénieur (masculine).
And putting "ingen" into google translate returns.. engineer.
Edit: @euroderf: Lol
It is called motor with respect to its effect, and machine with respect to how it works. A machine is called motor to denote it is connected to wheels or propellers, but service or repairs are technically performed on the machine.
This distinction can sound a little old-fashioned now.
Also, I was apparently using my own personal definition of "engine" that was somewhat different than the other modern usage.
To me, a "motor" is something that translates energy into motion. An "engine" is something that translates energy into work. So a motor is a kind of engine, and uses of "engine" in knowledge work is an analogy.
But when I think of things I call "motors" and "engines", I admit the distinction appears arbitrary (but clear nonetheless in my mind). For instance, if there's a device that moves things as a component of a larger machine, I'd call that device a "motor", but am likely to call the larger machine an "engine". And to go back to the pump, I'd call the device that moves to push the liquid a "motor", not an "engine", for no good reason.
As with much of English, this "rule" has enough exceptions as to question whether or not it should be called a "rule".
I put "rule" is scare quotes because what I was originally describing is decidedly not a rule at all, just a description of how I tend to use those words.
There are a few auto repair shops around here that even call themselves "motorworks".
When I was a child, I remember seeing some such accommodations calling themselves "motor hotels" or "motor lodges".
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rocket_motor&redi...
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Solid_rocket_moto...
engineer is translated as ingeniero, which originates from ingenious and not engine.
I realize that there are traditional terms like a "motor car" that has an engine.
But my ICE car has an engine, not a motor, because it burns fuel.
While my coffee grinder has a motor, not an engine, because it's electric.
I'm curious if there's anywhere in the anglophone world where this is not the common distinction.
(Even if there might be technical fields that have their own different technical definitions.)
English is just weird.
Truth is people just made stuff -bottom up- if some phrase was used it just spread out or not.
It is that even rather close neighbors might use different names or phrases for the same thing or same names for different things.
Even if at school you learn a generic version.
On a slight tangent, I took 3 years of Spanish in school in Texas where they taught Castilian Spanish instead of Mexican Spanish. You know how often I speak to Castilian Spanish people vs Mexican Spanish people...in Texas?
I was, however, vindicated later in life when I visited France and was able to get by without English.
Standing in line for currency exchange in Montreal behind a French couple almost broke my brain as I tried to listen into their conversation with the worker.
Thing is, we have such committees for English, and they say Internet should not be capitalized and I say it should, just like Earth or Sun, there's only one.
I think English is a language that lends itself to this rigid approach a bit more than some other languages, because of how common it is for English as a first language speakers to only speak English. Where I live there are a lot more languages, basically everybody is multilingual, and the level of slang, language mixing and other general bastardisation would probably make a lot of English speakers cringe…
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/literally
'The "in effect; virtually" meaning of literally is not new. It has been in regular use since the 18th century and may be found in the writings of some of the most highly regarded writers of the 19th and early 20th centuries, including Charles Dickens, Mark Twain, Charlotte Brontë, and James Joyce.'
https://harpers.org/wp-content/uploads/HarpersMagazine-2001-...
This is the norm for many languages. For example, French is prescribed by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acad%C3%A9mie_Fran%C3%A7aise , and they like to coin new terms and discourage popularly used terms.
But not English! It is the true global language with distributed decision-making.
Prescribed to who? Is it typical for French speakers to consult Académie Française before using slang, or inventing a portmanteau, or using other colloquialisms? I doubt many French people care much about the opinions of Académie Française, unless they’re actually trying to enforce the authority they believe themselves to have in some way.
The authority these institutions claim to have is almost always based on the same set of delusions. Some people care about this sort of formalism and will hold them in high esteem. Most people won’t care about their work, or will (I would say rightfully) see an institution like this as attempting to usurp authority over their language. Because a language doesn’t belong to any institution, it belongs to the speakers of that language, who are free to (and typically do) use it in whatever way they feel conveys what they’re trying to communicate.
The only time I’ve ever seen a language authority being widely valued by its community of speakers is where use of the language itself becomes a political issue, like when a mostly dead language is being revived, or when one camp strongly values the use of a language as part of their identity because some opposing camp has a different language.
Not enough dynamos: build more dynamos.
A generator is a device that converts mechanical power into electric power. A dynamo is a generator that uses a commutator to produce pulsed DC. An alternator is a generator that produces AC (which may later be rectified & filtered to DC). The term "alternator" is usually restricted to small generators used in automotive applications, larger AC generators such as those in power plants get described more precisely, e.g. induction generators or self-excitation generators. There are some other less-common generator types, such as homopolar generators that output continuous DC.
Seems like motors are smaller (or maybe less complex) than engines.
Engines came from steam motors too. Here's a distinction:
Is a steam engine a motor?
A steam motor is a form of steam engine used for light locomotives and light self-propelled motor cars used on railways. The origins of steam motor cars for railways go back to at least the 1850s, if not earlier, as experimental economizations for railways or railroads with marginal budgets.
Engines primarily convert chemical or thermal energy into mechanical power. The term is also applied metaphorically to a central component that drives a process or system.
> Pretending that they are anything but synonyms now is ridiculous and I'm glad the article pointed out that they are used that way instead of pretending that the older definitions still have merit like so many prescriptionist folks do.
So you are ok with having your opinion about this recorded in online forum's database motors and easily discovered by users of Google's search motor?
I view "motor" as a subtype of "engine". An engine drives a process or system, either literally (producing power from some fuel or other energy source) or figuratively (as in Google's search engine). A motor is a type of engine that changes the momentum of some object.
To me, a "motor" is a specific part of a system's powertrain: it's the part which converts some other type of energy into kinetic energy for the purposes of moving the system. On the other hand, an "engine" is a self-contained system that establishes some kind of stable feedback cycle to perform a task.
With that in mind, a car's internal combustion engine is the motor of the car, since that's the place where chemical energy becomes kinetic energy, which results in motion after being transferred through the drivetrain.
If you take the same exact engine out of the car, mount it in some fixed position, and rig it up to generate electricity, I wouldn't technically call it a "motor" anymore, because it's not acting to move the system it's a part of. (That being said, I probably wouldn't split hairs here, since the engine was originally designed to be a motor. But you see my point.)
Importantly, this lets us fit diesel trains into our definition: they use diesel engines to generate electricity, but electric motors to actually make the train move. In an old steam-driven train,
It also addresses the question of what to call the part of a model rocket that makes it go up. It's the part of the rocket's powertrain which converts chemical energy into kinetic energy that moves the system. It's a *motor*.
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So, with all that said, an interesting point is that the terms "motor engine" and "engine motor" both make sense, but don't mean the same thing. "Motor engine" describes an engine designed to perform the role of motor (as opposed to a "generator engine"), whereas "engine motor" describes a specific kind of motor (as opposed to a "chemical motor").
However, all engines producing motion would also be considered motors (what is under the hood of a classical ICE car is both an engine and a motor, and is just a motor in other Germanic languages), and most motors producing motors would not be referred to as engines (an EV does not have "electric engines").
So for the types of devices where you are likely going to have the discussion - things makings stuff move - motor is the supertype and engine is the subtype.
Yes, assuming you're OK with your foolishness being recorded the same way.
Just like you call it a "hydraulic motor" in the parenthesis, the former is an "electric motor" (or rather, "inductance motor", "reluctance motor", etc.).
The term "motor" is used for any conversion into mechanical power. Molecular motors and motor proteins are such examples of entirely chemical motors, albeit at quite small scales.
(The distinction also appears unique to English, as Germanic languages generally just have "motor".)
But feel free to call it all a motor - that's a clean superset of all the things an average person would use either term for[0], and most languages don't even have the "engine" term anyway, indeed using motor for the whole lot.
[1]: For other uses like "train engine", there are more distinct alternatives such as "locomotive".
I think your note about the -nik suffix is congruent with my point. A silnik is a thing that is doing/making siła.
To clarify, I’m perfectly aware that if I tell someone in Poland that I have a problem with my silnik, I’m referring to the engine in my vehicle. But in this discussion here, I’m talking about the most direct translation.
The only direct translation of the word is really just engine/motor, one can often use the word motor to mean silnik as well.
This can be evidenced[0], for example, in motorsport journalism.
> For more than a quarter of a century, Cosworth’s DFV (and it’s variants) was the off-the-peg powerplant of choice for independent F1 teams
Or of course, in the dictionary[1].
[0]: https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/article/the-best-engine-p...
[1]: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/power%20plant
In either case, calling a "silnik" a "powerplant" is a very large stretch, where as a "powerunit" would be a more accurate translation since it has the same meaning as a engine/motor.
I assure you it isn't.
> To increase the agility, steering response, handling and starting performance of the Macan T, Porsche uses a particularly light powerplant
https://media.porsche.com/mediakit/macan/en/the-new-macan/ma...
> Porsche has developed a hydrogen powerplant prototype that can be installed in luxury sports cars and perform as well as a 4.4-liter, eight-cylinder petrol engine
https://www.ryzehydrogen.com/2023/03/07/5172/
> Of course, removing the roof completely on a car boasting such a supreme powerplant presents its own set of unique aerodynamic challenges
https://www.ferrari.com/en-EN/magazine/articles/the-ferrari-...
> The Mercedes-AMG GLC 63 S E Performance allies a hefty 671bhp powerplant to a 2,310kg body
https://www.topgear.com/car-reviews/mercedes-benz/glc-amg-es...
> This article gives an outline of Formula One engines, also called Formula One power units since the hybrid era starting in 2014. Since its inception in 1947, Formula One has used a variety of engine regulations. Formulae limiting engine capacity had been used in Grand Prix racing on a regular basis since after World War I. The engine formulae are divided according to era.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formula_One_engines
You are also not really addressing the original point you where making that "powerplant" is a "direct translation" of the word "silnik".
I don't find your arguments convincing, for the logical holes I've spotted. I don't think you find my arguments convincing either, so I guess we'll leave it at that.
greetings from Nürnberg, Mittelfranken...
Dampfmaschine = steam engine
which unless specified otherwise boils down to locomotive...
the two languages are so similar yet different. what amazed me the most was that in English speaking countries they learn beautiful English words, famose worte of sorts.
I disagree, depending on the context you also use "Maschine" and "Triebwerk" in instances where english would use engine.
For example you would not translate "jet engine" to "Düsenmotor" but instead "Düsentriebwerk" and "steam engine" is translated to "Dampfmaschine"
A motor produces locomotion. It makes other things move.
An engine produces power. Locomotion can be derived from power but isn't required to.
A train locomotive might be referred to as a "locomotive engine".
A car with an internal combustion engine moves from power generated by that engine. But a car with electric motors does not have an engine because power is not produced there. Power is produced elsewhere and then stored in the battery. Locomotion is produced by consuming the stored power.
Of course, that's just my interpretation of the two words without referring to a dictionary.
By this definition, is a fuel cell an engine?
https://www.energy.gov/eere/fuelcells/fuel-cells#:~:text=A%2....
Or in other words: the power that a gasoline engine uses wasn't produced in the engine, it was produced by geological and chemical means, and in a giant refinery somewhere else.
I am not at all sure why.
This is an enormously valuable concept: that plots require both participants and also people who do not just direct it or order it, or even just design it, hands off (often called "the architect of the plot"). They need people who are there from start to finish, like an author is; involved in every corner.
I almost always use the term motor for an electromechanical machine that turns electrical into mechanical power.
Like all words, there's ambiguity to it.
Motor comes from latin "that which moves something", for example in italian that's "motore".
Engineer is "ingegnere", someone who uses "ingegno". So I'd argue the word for engine, in italian at least, is "marchingegno", which has somewhat a bad connotation (overly complex). I'm unsure if this was always the case. Translators give "contraption" which fits my understanding for the english word. So a generic word for a complex machine that does something.
That said it's not used and you'll never hear someone talking about the marchingegno in a FIAT panda
[0]: I've been working my way through this book: https://www.amazon.com/Design-Brushless-Permanent-Magnet-Mac...
Always thought calling car engine a motor is incorrect, shouldn’t be used interchangeably. In my experience machinery would be common name for both in engineering terms, not daily usage.
Motor converts equivalent forms of energy, or down, at very high efficiency. Electric to kinetic
And thus we get a common root for the words engine and genius. Fascinating.
Engines are chemically driven and use some flavor of combination to rotate a shaft.
Ehhh that's a stretch, unless we're talking Real Housewives type of "lay people".
As I understand it (within an engineering context), a "motor" converts electrical energy to mechanical energy, and an "engine" takes thermal/chemical/some other form of mechanical energy and outputs mechanical energy. But it's confusing because I've changed the "motor" in my old Honda when I was a teenager. So while I agree there is some nuance and blurry lines, not sure the two words are quite "interchangeable".
That seems better than making arbitrary distinctions regarding which type of input energy is being transformed into which output type. It would also be compatible with the OED definition mentioned in the article, as well as terminology used in rocketry.
This fits every definition I can think of.