Efficient use of rare earth elements in rotors

The growth of electric mobility and the expansion of wind energy have already led to greater demand for the rare earth material neodymium. This development will continue to intensify and rising prices will be the result. The increased power requirements for small drives and pumps, with simultaneous requirements such as miniaturization and weight reduction, necessitate the use of high-performance rare earth elements. That’s why neodymium materials must be used as effectively as possible, i.e. with minimum use of materials. The use of samarium iron nitrite must also be pushed. Since the mining of neodymium also produces large quantities of samarium, the availability is higher than the demand. This means that a certain price stability can be expected for samarium for years to come. Material price fixing over project durations is therefore fundamentally conceivable.
Based on this assessment, we have developed a process that can minimize the use of materials through a targeted combination of hard ferrite materials with rare earth materials and optimally adapt the power density according to customer requirements. Depending on the operating temperature ranges and environmental conditions, we use neodymium iron boron or samarium iron nitrite in addition to the hard ferrite base material. In many cases, the magnetic yokes (iron core, laminated core) that are needed can also be replaced by the plastic-bonded hard ferrite magnets.