Recent development of Nd-Fe-B sintered magnets and their applications

Many new applications of Nd-Fe-B magnets have emerged in the past two decades. Recently, motor application has taken over VCM position which was the dominant application in Nd-Fe-B sintered magnet previously. Motor market is expected to expand in future because of strong energy saving requirements from the automobile and electric appliances markets. Magnetic property improvement in residual magnetization (Br) and coercive force (H-cJ) helped the rapid growth of the motor market. Magnetic properties are still rapidly improving and many technologies for powder alignment are also being invented. A new world record of magnetic properties with B-r = 1.555 T, (BH)(max) = 474 kJ/m(3) H-cJ = 653 kA/m was established by NEOMAX Co. Ltd. (C) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.