2001 Volume 48 Issue 8 Pages 697-702
In this paper, characteristics of the amorphous soft-magnetic alloy powders fabricated by the new atomization process "SWAP; Spinning Water Atomization Process" with both of high quenching rate and possibility of the mass-production are presented.
In the equipment, gas-atomized droplets are rapidly quenched by the effect of centrifugal force of the high speed spinning water. The speed, the depth and the temperature of the spinning water influence the quenching rate of droplets. Fe-Si-B alloy powders produced by this method were in the amorphous state at particle size up to 300μm in diameter and exhibited good soft-magnetic properties and very low oxygen contents of about 100-200ppm. The powder surface observed by SEM was smooth and their morphology was spherical for finer particle and rather flat for larger particle, suitable for forming consolidated powder core. Therefore, "SWAP" is expected to be useful for high production yield of amorphous powder and to be available for development of amorphous powder cores.
