Does anyone know where I can buy ferrite cores/rods, roughly 1 inch in diameter by 3 inches long? Nobody seems to sell them which is really strange considering how abundant Iron is.
Ferrite is a standard for high frequency magnetics, but is not "the standard". It has low magnetic permeability, so it not good if you want a high magnetic field electromagnet.
For DC electromagnets a soft, high permeability material is normally used, such as iron or various nickel-iron alloys.
Ferrite is a standard for high frequency magnetics, but is not "the standard". It has low magnetic permeability, so it not good if you want a high magnetic field electromagnet.
For DC electromagnets a soft, high permeability material is normally used, such as iron or various nickel-iron alloys.
Ok, I got what you guys are saying. A hard ferrite is preferable over soft. But nonetheless, ferrite = iron. Also if its too hard, it retains magnetism, which is bad for electromagnets when you need them to turn off.
Thanks to both of you, you really help. Just a quick question, what if you used an actual ferrite magnet as the core? Would it be really strong when you turn it on? And when it's off, it would go back to normal strength I assume.
In normal engineering use of the term, when magnetics are referred to as ferrite, it means they are made from various magnetic iron compounds. Thus your ferrite rods are unlikely to be pure iron.
In normal engineering use of the term, when magnetics are referred to as ferrite, it means they are made from various magnetic iron compounds. Thus your ferrite rods are unlikely to be pure iron.
Not to bother you guys anymore, but if you look at the link i gave you, there is a ferrite core that has 2,000μ permeability. I'm sure it must be better than the dura-bar I'm using. But I also noticed that electrical steel has a permeability of around 4,000μ. Is there point where permeability gets too high?
Don't they use the ferrite powder to make inductor cores because it has a better "magnetic elasticity"? As in it won't turn into a magnet itself as easily as pure iron does?
For an electromagnet, I doubt there is too much permeability.
They use ferrite powder at higher frequencies, mainly because it has a high electrical resistance, unlike iron alloys, and thus very low eddy current loss, which is proportional to frequency.
Reducing eddy current loss is the reason they laminate iron power transformer cores with an insulating layer between the laminations.