‘‘Material technology report’’

“Ferrite magnets”

Name: Mohamed Adel Mostafa

Sec: 5
code: 9211009
Submitted to: Dr. Eng. Sherif Ali Abd El Rahman
 What are ferrite magnets ?
Ferrite is a ceramic material
made by mixing and firing
iron(III) oxide (Fe2O3, rust) with
one or more additional metallic
elements, such as strontium,
barium, manganese, nickel, and
zinc. They are ferrimagnetic,
meaning they are attracted by
magnetic fields and can be
magnetized to become permanent magnets. Unlike other
ferromagnetic materials most ferrites are not electrically
conductive, making them useful in applications like magnetic
cores for transformers to suppress eddy currents. Ferrites can be
divided into two families based on their resistance to being
demagnetized (magnetic coercivity).

➢ Hard ferrites: have high coercivity, so are difficult to

demagnetize. They are used to make permanent magnets
for applications such as refrigerator magnets, loudspeakers,
and small electric motors.

➢ Soft ferrites: have low coercivity, so they easily change their

magnetization and act as conductors of magnetic fields.
They are used in the electronics industry to make efficient
magnetic cores called ferrite cores for high-frequency
 inductors, transformers and antennas, and in various
microwave components.

Ferrite magnets properties

Ferrite permanent magnets have good machining properties
which allows them to be cut into different shapes and sizes. they
are cut with diamond tooling; standard drills and wire spark
erosion techniques do not work (they are electrically insulating so
current does not pass through them due to their extremely high
electrical resistance, hence their other name of Ceramic
Magnets).

Ferrite magnets are made by wet or dry pressing and sometimes

by extrusion. Wet pressing gives stronger magnetic properties
(e.g. Ferrite C8). Dry pressing gives improved dimensional
tolerances (e.g. Ferrite C5). The magnets are then sintered to
fuse the powder together and are then machined to final shape.
The extrusion method can be applied to produce arc segment
shapes which are then cut to length. Sometimes new tooling is
required to produce the ferrite magnets if existing tooling does not
allow the shape to be produced. Typical tolerances for ferrite
magnets are +/-0.25mm although +/-3% is also used.

When Ferrite magnets get hotter, their high intrinsic coercivity

improves (improving resistance to demagnetization) making them
extremely popular in motor and generator designs and in
loudspeaker applications (only ferrite magnets become noticeably
more resistant to demagnetization when heated). Ferrite magnets
have a positive temperature coefficient of Intrinsic Coercivity (it
changes by +0.27 %/deg C from ambient) and only ferrite shows
this amount of this characteristic. However, the magnetic output
does fall with temperature (it has a negative temperature
coefficient of Induction of -0.2 %/degC from ambient). The result
is that Ferrite magnets (ceramic magnets) can be used at high
temperatures with very few issues.

Ferrite magnets can be used up to +250 degrees C (and in some

cases up to +300 deg C) making it ideal for use in electrical
machines and most high temperature applications. At sub-zero
temperatures e.g. less than -10 to -20 deg C, ferrite magnets may
start to show a reduced pull force (the temperature and the
degree of weakening depends on the magnet shape and is
application specific; in most applications the temperature of
operation is not low enough for this effect to happen). This is
because if its +0.27 %/deg C temperature coefficient of Intrinsic
Coercivity – the Hci falls as the magnet gets colder. Ferrite can
demagnetise if put in too cold an environment, but it is the total
magnetic circuit design that determines how cold the magnet
must be before any weakening is noted (e.g. operating at
temperatures as low as -60 deg C is possible with careful design).
 How ferrite magnets are made
Ferrite Magnets (Ceramic Magnets) are produced by calcining (at
between 1000 to 1350 degrees C) a mixture of iron oxide (Fe2O3)
and strontium carbonate (SrCO3) or barium carbonate (BaCO3)
to form a metallic oxide. In some grades, other chemicals such as
cobalt (Co) and lanthanum (La) are added to improve the
magnetic performance. This metallic oxide is then milled to a
small particle size (less than a millimeter in size; usually a few
microns).

There are two chemical varieties of ferrite magnet:

➢ Strontium ferrite is known by two chemical symbols:-
SrFe12O19 or SrO.6Fe2O3

➢ Barium ferrite is also known by two chemical symbols

BaFe12O19 or BaO.6Fe2O3

Simplified process:

SrCO3 + Fe2O3 > SrOFe2O3 + CO2

SrOFe2O3 + 5Fe2O3 > SrO.6(Fe2O3)

BaCO3 + Fe2O3 > BaOFe2O3 + CO2

BaOFe2O3 + 5Fe2O3 > BaO.6(Fe2O3)
The process has two main production options depending on the
type of magnet required:

➢ The first method is to press the dry fine powder in a die

which results in an isotropic magnet (e.g. ferrite C1 grade)
which has better dimensional tolerances (it will often not
require any further machining to final size). The hexagonal
crystal structure is random allowing the magnet to be
magnetized in any direction afterwards.

➢ The second method involves mixing the fine powder with

water to produce a slurry which is then compacted in a die in
the presence of an externally applied magnetic field. The
external magnetic field helps the hexagonal crystal structure
align more perfectly with the magnetic field, improving the
magnetic performance (e.g. ferrite C8) – the water in the
slurry acts like a lubricant. This results in an anisotropic
ferrite magnet with stronger magnetic properties, but it will
possibly require additional machining stages to give the final
dimensions. Sometimes a wet extrusion is performed instead
of wet die pressing (to make arcs for example) – the magnet
is then cut to required after sintering (sintering is the next
stage).
 Manufacture of Ferrite Magnets in Egypt
There is no production of permanent magnets in Egypt, which
affects the competitiveness of Egyptian electromechanical
products and the ability of the industrial sector to new designs and
innovative products badly. we can save a lot of money by
producing ferrite magnet in Egypt instead of importing it.so , how
could we manufacture ferrite magnets in Egypt ?

The synthesis of ferrite magnet consists of:

➢ Preparation of input materials: powder of BaCo3
were mixed with fe2o3 at the optimum composition and
the desirable substitutions.

➢ Calcination: heating the mixture of finely-powdered

material at 1250℃ for 1 hour.

➢ Milling: calcined billets were mixed in a conventional

double-cone mixer at 180 rpm for 6 h to achieve
homogenization and remove any clusters of powders.
1% of (Sio2 + Cao) was added.

➢ Pressing: The powders were mixed with 0.5 wt %

paraffin wax as a lubricant to reduce friction during
compaction and liquid acetone was used as a process
control agent. The mixed powders were dried at 80°C
for 30 min and cold compacted into φ22x4 mm discs at
room temperature in a uniaxial press at 500 MPa
➢ Sintering: This step is also called firing, and includes
heating the pressed billets separately at 1050, 1150 or
1250°C. The prepared green compacts were dried for
30 min at temperature 200°C for complete removal of
moisture, entrapped gases, and other impurities.
Furthermore, sintering of all the green compacts was
Carried out using a ceramic tubular furnace in air for 1
hour at the investigated temperatures. Heating rate was
of 12 ℃/min.

➢ Magnetization: In this process, the magnet shapes are

magnetized using a pulse magnetizer.

➢ Bonded magnets: polymer-bonded magnets were

prepared as a composite material for industrial
application. In this process, the prepared mixture of
ferrite magnet powder was mixed with melt LLDPE
powder Sabic M50) using in a twin screw extruder. Two
volume concentrations of 10 and 40% ferrite powder,
were used. The mixed material moved from zone 1 to 4,
at temperatures of 130, 135, 140, 130°C respectively,
and the die zone temperature was 140°C. The screw
speed was 50 rpm. The product was cooled through
water path at room temperature, and granulated to
3mm granules. The granules were pressed in a sheet
mold in hot press at 140°C for 5 min., then cooled, for
magnetic plastic sheet preparation.
➢ X-ray diffraction (XRD): XRD analysis was carried out
on a diffractometer model Burcker D8 Advance with Ni
filtered and Cu target, Kɑ radiation. The crystallite size,
the amount of dissolved powders and the constituent
phases of the sintered samples were estimated.

➢ Magnetic properties: These properties were

measured using a 9600-1 LDJ vibrating sample
magnetometer (VSM) (Figure 5) in which the samples
were vibrated at a constant frequency between a set of
sense coils. As the magnetic field is varied through a
specified range the magnetic moment of the sample is
measured by the sense coils with a lock-in amplifier.
The dependency between the magnetization and
magnetic field (hysteresis loop) for the prepared
samples was measured. The magnetization values
were expressed using the magnetic moment per gram
(electromagnetic unit/gram) emu/g as magnetization
unit. The measured properties included saturation
magnetization (Ms), coercivity (Hc), and retentivity (Mr).
 Ferrite magnet V.S Neodymium Magnets

Property Ferrite Magnets Neodymium Magnets

Ceramic material, Rare-earth metal alloy, primarily

Composition
iron oxide neodymium

Magnetic
Relatively low Extremely high
Strength

Maximum
Low Very high
Energy Product

Coercivity Low High

Curie
Relatively low High
Temperature

Cost Low Relatively high

Resistant to
Corrosion Prone to corrosion
corrosion

Temperature
Good Moderate to low
Stability

Electric motors, generators,

Speaker magnets,
Applications magnetic assemblies, high-
motors, transformers
performance applications
 Ring ferrite
Ring ferrite refers to a type of
ferrite core that is shaped like a
ring or toroid. Ferrite is a ceramic
material with magnetic properties
that make it useful for a variety of
electronic applications, particularly
in high-frequency circuits and
devices.
The ring ferrite core is typically made from a mixture of iron oxide
(Fe2O3) and other metal oxides, such as manganese oxide
(MnO) or nickel oxide (NiO). This composition gives the ferrite
core its magnetic properties, including high magnetic permeability
and low electrical conductivity.

Ring ferrite cores are commonly used in inductor and transformer

applications. The toroidal shape provides several advantages
over other core shapes, such as improved magnetic coupling,
reduced electromagnetic interference (EMI), and lower losses.
The circular geometry also helps to minimize the leakage of
magnetic flux and increases the efficiency of the magnetic circuit.

Ring ferrite cores are widely used in various electronic devices

and systems, including power supplies, RF filters, antennas, and
magnetic amplifiers. They are particularly effective in applications
that require high-frequency operation, such as radio
communications, telecommunications, and power electronics