Effect of soft magnetic phase addition on the microstructure and properties of SmCo5/FeCo anisotropic nanocomposite powders

High coercivity SmCo(5 )was used as hard phase and SmCo5/FeCo dual-phase nanocomposite powders had been successfully fabricated by chemical coating high magnetization FeCo soft phase on the surface of hard phase. The effect of different addition amounts of FeCo on the microstructure and magnetic properties of the composites was systematically investigated. Optimal magnetic properties, including magnetic energy product (25.7 MGOe), saturation magnetization (102 emu/g), remanence (97 emu/g) and high coercivity (16.9 kOe) were simulta-neously obtained when the nominal addition of 10 wt% FeCo soft magnetic phase was coated. Poly-vinylpyrrolidone (PVP) was used as surfactant, which guaranty both Fe and Co atoms were coated. The good performance is ascribed to nano-sized below 15 nm and well-distributed of soft phase and small grain size of hard phase.