5.7 Permanent Magnets and Electromagnets
Substances which at room temperature retain their ferromagnetic property for a long period of time are called permanent magnets. Permanent magnets can be made in a variety of ways. One can hold an iron rod in the north-south direction and hammer it repeatedly. The method is illustrated in Fig. 5.15. The illustration is from a 400 year old book to emphasise that the making of permanent magnets is an old art. One can also hold a steel rod and stroke it with one end of a bar magnet a large number of times, always in the same sense to make a permanent magnet.
A blacksmith forging a permanent magnet by striking a red-hot rod of iron kept in the north-south direction with a hammer. The sketch is recreated from an illustration in De Magnete, a work published in 1600 and authored by William Gilbert, the court physician to Queen Elizabeth of England.
An efficient way to make a permanent magnet is to place a ferromagnetic rod in a solenoid and pass a current. The magnetic field of the solenoid magnetises the rod.
The hysteresis curve (Fig. 5.14) allows us to select suitable materials for permanent magnets. The material should have high retentivity so that the magnet is strong and high coercivity so that the magnetisation is not erased by stray magnetic fields, temperature fluctuations or minor mechanical damage. Further, the material should have a high permeability. Steel is one-favoured choice. It has a slightly smaller retentivity than soft iron but this is outweighed by the much smaller coercivity of soft iron. Other suitable materials for permanent magnets are alnico, cobalt steel and ticonal.
Core of electromagnets are made of ferromagnetic materials which have high permeability and low retentivity. Soft iron is a suitable material for electromagnets. On placing a soft iron rod in a solenoid and passing a current, we increase the magnetism of the solenoid by a thousand fold. When we switch off the solenoid current, the magnetism is effectively switched off since the soft iron core has a low retentivity. The arrangement is shown in Fig. 5.16.
A soft iron core in solenoid acts as an electromagnet.
In certain applications, the material goes through an ac cycle of magnetisation for a long period. This is the case in transformer cores and telephone diaphragms. The hysteresis curve of such materials must be narrow. The energy dissipated and the heating will consequently be small. The material must have a high resistivity to lower eddy current losses. You will study about eddy currents in Chapter 6.
Electromagnets are used in electric bells, loudspeakers and telephone diaphragms. Giant electromagnets are used in cranes to lift machinery, and bulk quantities of iron and steel.