Synthesis of composite powders for the Fe2O3-Zn system by mechanical alloying (MA) has been investigated at room temperature. Optimal milling and heat treatment conditions to obtain soft magnetic composite with fine microstructure were investigated by X-ray diffraction, differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM) measurement. It is found that α-Fe/ZnO composite powders in which ZnO is dispersed in α-Fe matrix can be obtained by MA of Fe2O3 with Zn for 4 hours. The change in magnetization and coercivity also reflects the details of the solid-state reduction process of hematite by pure metal of Zn during MA. Densification of the MA powders was performed in a spark plasma sintering (SPS) machine at 900 ~ 1,000 ℃ under 60 MPa. Shrinkage change after SPS of sample MA'ed for 5 hrs was significant above 300 ℃ and gradually increased with increasing temperature up to 800 ℃. X-ray diffraction results show that the average grain size of α-Fe in the α-Fe/ZnO composite sintered at 900 ℃ is in the range of 110 nm.

Fabrication of soft magnetic composite powders for the Fe2O3-Ca system by mechanical alloying(MA) has been investigated at room temperature. It is found that soft magnetic composite powders in which CaO is dispersed in α-Fe matrix are obtained by MA of Fe2O3 with Ca for 5 hours. Changes in magnetization and coercivity also reflect the details of the solidstate reduction process of hematite by pure metal of Ca during MA. The saturation magnetization of MA powders increases with increasing MA time and reaches a maximum value of 65 emu/g after 7 hours of MA. The average grain size of α-Fe in MA powders, estimated by diffraction line-width, gradually decreases with increasing MA time and reaches 52 nm after 5 hours of MA. It can also be seen that the coercivity of the 5-hour MA sample is fairly high at 190 Oe, suggesting that the grain refinement of already-produced α-Fe tends to clearly occur during MA.

The electromagnetic wave absorption sheets were fabricated by mixing of nanocrystalline soft magnetic powder, charcoal powder and polymer based binder. The complex permittivity, complex permeability, and scattering parameter have been measured using a network analyzer in the frequency range of 10 MHz10 GHz. The results showed that complex permittivity of sheets was largely dependent on the frequency and the amount of charcoal powder : The permittivity was improved up to 100 MHz, however the value was decreased above 1 GHz. The power loss of electromagnetic wave absorption data showed almost the same tendency as the results of complex permittivity. However, the complex permeability was not largely affected by the frequency, and the values were decreased with the addition of charcoal powder. Based on the results, it can be summarized that the addition of charcoal powder was very effective to improve the EM wave absorption in the frequency range of 10 MHz1 GHz.

Innovative SMC with low iron loss was made from iron powders with evaporated MgO insulation coating. The coating had greater heat-resistance than conventional phosphatic insulation coating, which enabled stress relieving annealing at higher temperature. Magnetic properties of toroidal samples (OD35mm,ID25mm, t5) were examined. The iron loss at 50Hz for Bm = 1.5T was lower 50% of conventional SMC and was almost the same with silicon iron laminations(t0.35). It became clear that MgO insulation coating has enough heat resistance and adhesiveness to powdersurface to obtain innovative SMC with low iron loss.

Improvement of the strength is one of the most important subjects on soft magnetic composite (SMC) to increase the applica ble items. In this study, lubricants for inner lubricating SMC, which can be produced in lower cost than die wall-lubricatin g SMC, varied to investigate their effect on the strength. The newly developed SMC with self-lubricating resin shows high st rength equivalent to that of SMC obtained by die wall lubrication.

SMC(Soft Magnetic Composite) materials which we have newly developed were studied for their applying effects. It shows almost the same motor output power as the laminated Si-steels of 0.35mm in thickness, although core loss of SMC is about 1.5 times that of the laminations. As shown in the results, the SMC motor core is sufficient for real use as a motor core. Furthermore, a 3-D shaped motor core made of SMC can improve approximately 20% of the output compared with the same size motor made of laminations.