The domestic white goods market covers a wide range of home appliances ranging from small battery operated food mixers and stirrers to large washing machines, tumble driers, vacuum cleaners and refrigerators. The majority of the large machines are now subject to legislation calling for the testing and identification of the efficiency rating for individual machines. This has also become a large factor in the marketing and selling of these products.

The ever increasing demand for improved efficiencies in domestic appliances has created many innovative designs from electrical and machine engineers. Reduction in motor size, weight, complexity and cost all contribute to energy saving within this sector. BREMAG plastic bonded magnets can play a large part in achieving these efficiencies. Simpler motor assembly with the use of multi-pole rings has reduced assembly time and  costs while the advantages of Halbach design , facilitated by the isotropic nature of plastic bonded magnets has substantially improved the efficiency in the motor performance. Motors formerly consisting of many magnets on a central hub can now be replaced with a single, multi-pole magnetised ring, greatly reducing assembly time and cost and opportunities for error.  As the motors move toward digital control, there is a growing need for further magnets in position sensing and counting strategies within the motor and associated control system.

Plastic Bonded Magnets

The performance of plastic bonded magnets can be tailored down to suit the application requirements, thus providing an opportunity for further cost savings.

Plastic bonded magnets offer high energy (10MGOe) with low mass (6gms/cc), low cost tooling and multi-pole magnetisation profiles, making them ideal for permanent magnet motors. Typical uses include, high speed rotors for vacuum cleaners, linear drives for refrigeration compressors and small, light-weight motors for hand operated food mixers and other battery operated devices such as electric toothbrushes, shavers and cordless hair driers.

The ease of manufacture, variable material grades and magnetisation profiles also offer a simple prototype design route, allowing machining of suitable sample geometries for proof of concept and demonstrator units before any commitment for  tooling