Education AlNiCo magnet

You will find in this category horseshoe magnets or educational magnets to visualize the north and south poles of the magnet.

We are talking about AlNiCo (Aluminium/Nickel/Cobalt) magnets, which is the alloy used to make these magnets. AlNiCo magnets, like all our magnets, magnetize on steel surfaces such as a refrigerator door, whiteboard, etc. 

The AlNiCo magnets that you will find here are educational magnets: the north and south poles are indicated in red and green respectively. These bar or horseshoe shaped magnets will allow you to discover the forces of attraction and repulsion of a magnetic field. 

Why are AlNiCo magnets perfect for discovering magnetic fields?

These AlNiCo magnets have different properties from the neodymium magnets we sell in other magnetiques.fr categories.

The education magnets you will find in this category are magnets made of an aluminum, nickel and cobalt alloy (AlNiCo Magnet). This alloy is known to offer, when the magnet is electrically charged, relatively strong magnetic properties (at equal size, they are more powerful than ferrite magnets). 

Less powerful than neodymium, iron and boron magnets (NdFeB magnet), they handle safely.

Other advantages: they are less brittle, more resistant to shocks and can withstand higher temperatures up to 450°C, unlike neodymium magnets which lose their magnetic properties above 80°C.

The strength of the AlNiCo alloy makes it possible to shape rounded shapes such as the horseshoe-shaped magnet, which would be much more complicated with the neodymium-based alloy.

In contrast, AlNiCo magnets are very sensitive to demagnetization. They must be thick for the magnetic field integrity to remain stable. Do not approach neodymium magnets in contact with AlNiCo magnet, they could demagnetize.

The horseshoe magnet, a classic of educational magnets

The U-shaped magnet, also known as a horseshoe magnet, is an easily recognizable magnet: it is this magnet that is commonly used to illustrate magnetism in pictograms and signage.

We all have in mind the image of an overpowered U-shaped magnet that attracts scrap metal from meters away. 

In reality the AlNiCo horseshoe magnet is much less dangerous. The north and south poles of the magnet are located at each end of the U, the north pole is indicated in red and the south pole in green.

Note that the magnetic field is not uniform throughout the horseshoe, so the magnetization will be much more important at the ends of the U.