Ironsand (Titanomagnetite-Titanohematite): Chemistry, Magnetic Properties and Direct Applications for Wireless Power Transfer.

Jérôme Leveneur,Nick Long,John Kennedy,Emma Anquillare,John Boys,Grant Covic,William J Trompetter,Seho Kim,Shen V Chong,Murray Mccurdy,Ben Rumsey,Vedran Jovic,Kevin E Smith

doi:10.3390/ma14185455

Abstract

Ironsand is an abundant and inexpensive magnetic mineral resource. However, the magnetic properties of unprocessed ironsand are often inadequate for any practical applications. In this work, the applicability of ironsand for use as a component in a soft magnetic composite for large-scale inductive power transfer applications was investigated. After magnetic separation, the chemical, structural and magnetic properties of ironsand sourced from different locations were compared. Differences observed in the DC magnetic properties were consistent with changes in the chemical compositions obtained from X-ray Absorption Near-Edge Spectroscopy (XANES), which suggests varying the titanohematite to titanomagnetite content. Increased content in titanomagnetite and magnetic permeability correlated well with the total Fe content in the materials. The best-performing ironsand with the highest permeability and lowest core losses was used alongside Mn,Zn-Ferrite particles (ranging from ∼100 m to 2 mm) to fabricate toroid cores with varying magnetic material loading. It was shown that ironsand can be used to replace up to 15 wt.% of the magnetic materials with minimal impact on the composite magnetic performance, thus reducing the cost. Ironsand was also used as a supporting material in a single-rail wireless power transfer system, effectively increasing the power transfer, demonstrating potential applications to reduce flux leakage.

Highlights

Ironsand is an important resource for steel and titanium production but has seen limited application beyond that
By including an explanation of the ironsand chemistry, we show how different ironsand compositions might affect other properties
The best fit was obtained with different values of x and μ1 than what was found previously for composite materials with a single filler. This suggest that this model and other related models, such as Ollendorff’s [66] or the Clausius–Mossotti formulae [67], are not suitable for the current experimental dataset. These results suggest that it is possible to reach the same magnetic permeability with an Soft Magnetic Composite (SMC) material where 15 wt.% of ferrite is replaced by ironsand

Summary

Introduction

Ironsand is an important resource for steel and titanium production but has seen limited application beyond that. New Zealand’s ironsand with its iron content in the form of titanomagnetite and titanohematite makes it a useful supply for titanium. While this ironsand has been exported and used in New Zealand for steel manufacturing for more than 40 years [1,2], there is still ample research to simplify the processing mechanisms and expand the applications of this inexpensive commodity. Applications requiring large quantities of low-magnetic-permeability materials could benefit from such an inexpensive resource. One such application is Inductive Power Transfer (IPT) for vehicle charging

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Results

Conclusion