High permeability and low core loss Fe-based soft magnetic composites with Co-Ba composite ferrite insulation layer obtained by sol-gel method

ABSTRACT To balance the core loss and permeability of soft magnetic composites (SMCs), a Co-Ba composite ferrite insulation layer was employed to clad the surface of reduced iron powder by sol-gel method. The successful preparation of the honeycomb-like Co-Ba composite ferrite coating layer was verified by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), the composition of the coating was determined by X-ray diffraction (XRD), and the magnetic properties were tested with a B-H curve analyzer. BSEM images of the polished cross-section and core loss separation results confirmed that an excessively high annealing temperature causes the composite ferrite insulation layer to fail. A high effective permeability of up to 121 at 300 kHz and low core loss (Pcv) of 129 kW/m3 at 100 kHz and 0.02 T were obtained in prepared samples at the optimized annealing temperature of 500 °C. Subsequently, simulation analysis based on the Clausius-Maxwell formula model was used to confirm the feasibility of the enhancement on effective permeability in Fe@Co-Ba composite ferrite theoretically. The agreement between simulation and experimental results further indicated that a good balance between the core loss and permeability of Fe-based SMCs was achieved by Co-Ba composite ferrite cladding.