The application of original magnesium mainly focuses on magnesium alloy production, steel-making desulfurization, and also in rare earth alloy, metal reduction, corrosion protection, and other fields. Magnesium desulfurization is used in many steel plants, and the desulfurization effect of magnesium particles is better than calcium carbide; the use of magnesium sacrificial anode for cathodic protection is an effective method to prevent metal corrosion. Magnesium sacrificial anode is widely used in an oil pipeline, natural gas, gas pipeline and storage tank, smelter, gas station, and water heater, heat exchanger, evaporator, boiler, and other equipment.
Application of magnesium alloy
Magnesium alloy has good lightweight, cutting property, corrosion resistance, shock absorption, stable size, and impact resistance, which is far superior to other materials. These characteristics make magnesium alloy widely used in many fields, such as transportation, electronic industry, medical treatment, military industry, etc., which only increases and does not decrease. Especially in 3C products (computer, consumer electronic products, communication), high-speed rail, automobiles, bicycles, aerospace, architectural decoration, hand tools, medical rehabilitation devices, and other fields, it has become one of the development directions of new materials in the future. Of the more than 400 new materials catalog supported development during the 12th Five Year Plan period, the Ministry of industry and information technology has 12 magnesium-related categories.
Aircraft
Since the 20th century, magnesium alloy has been used in aerospace. Because magnesium alloy can greatly improve the aerodynamic performance of aircraft and reduce its structure weight, many parts are made of it. Magnesium alloy for general aviation is mainly sheet and extrusion profile, and a small part is casting. At present, magnesium alloy is used in aviation, including civil and military aircraft civil motor parts, propeller, gearbox, support structure, rocket, missile, and satellite parts. With the development of magnesium alloy production technology, the performance will be improved and the application scope will be expanded.
Car
Magnesium alloy has been widely used in the automobile dashboard, seat bracket, transmission case, direction control system components, engine cover, door, engine block, frame, and other parts in developed countries. The magnesium alloy can reduce vehicle weight, reduce fuel consumption, reduce exhaust emissions, improve the integration of parts and improve the flexibility of automobile design. Generally, the fuel efficiency can be increased by 5.5% and the exhaust emission will be reduced accordingly for every 10% reduction of the vehicle weight. There are two ways to make the vehicle lightweight: one is to optimize the structure; the other is to select lightweight materials. Aluminum alloy, plastic (resin-based composite material), and magnesium alloy are three kinds of materials that are considered to be ideal at present. Magnesium alloy dies casting is the lightest of all die casting alloys, which is a competitive lightweight material for automobiles. A large number of magnesium alloy parts are produced to replace plastic, aluminum alloy, and even steel parts. With the development of technology, magnesium alloy will be widely used in the automobile field.
Electronic communication
With the development of digital technology, the market has higher and higher integration, light, miniaturization, and environmental protection requirements for electronic and communication products. Engineering pigments used to be the main materials, but their strength could not be compared with metal. Magnesium alloy has excellent Thin-walled Casting properties, and its wall thickness can reach 0.6-1.0mm, and maintain certain strength, rigidity, and anti-collision ability. This is very conducive to the requirements of ultra-thin, ultra-light, and miniaturization of the products, which is incomparable to engineering pigments.
At present, the electrical products of magnesium alloy parts include cameras, cameras, digital cameras, laptops, mobile phones, TV sets, plasma displays, hard disk drives, etc. With the development of 3C products, which are represented by notebook computers, mobile phones, and digital cameras, the application of magnesium alloy has been growing continuously with the development of light, thin, short, and small directions.
Medical care
In the medical field, magnesium is first introduced as a plastic surgery biomaterial. Because of its many characteristics and properties, magnesium implants and similar applications have become very attractive choices. In the early stage, stainless steel, titanium alloy, and cobalt-chromium alloy were used for medical implanted metal materials. The advantages of the materials were good corrosion resistance and could maintain the overall structural stability for a long time in the body. However, after a period of time after implantation of these metal materials, many patients will suffer. Because these materials cannot be integrated with the body, harmful metal ions are dissolved, causing human allergy, and they need to be removed through secondary operation after the disease is cured.
Therefore, the biodegradable medical metal materials will become the future research and development direction of implant materials, and magnesium alloy closest to human bone density has unique advantages (magnesium alloy density is about 1.7g/cm 3, and human bone density is about 1.75 g/cm 3).
Magnesium alloy is easy to be processed and formed and has excellent comprehensive mechanical properties and unique biodegradation function. Magnesium is one of the necessary macro metal elements for the human body, so magnesium alloy is the best choice for medical metal materials. The elastic modulus of magnesium alloy is about 45gpa, which is close to the human skeleton (10-40gpa), which can effectively alleviate or even avoid the “stress shielding effect”; magnesium ions released by magnesium alloy in the human body can also promote the proliferation and differentiation of bone cells, and promote the growth and healing of bones. Moreover, the processing properties of magnesium alloy are much better than that of other biodegradable implants such as PLA and calcium phosphate, so it has clinical application value in the cardiovascular stent.
Military project
The use of magnesium alloy in military equipment can improve the strength of structural parts, reduce the weight of equipment and improve the hit rate of weapons. At the same time, magnesium alloy can meet the requirements of noise absorption, shock absorption, and radiation protection in aerospace and other high-tech fields, and obviously improve the aerodynamic performance of the aircraft and reduce the structure weight. Therefore, magnesium alloy is often used in the manufacture of the cabinet frame, wall plate, support, hub, cylinder block, cylinder headbox, and piston of an engine, and magnesium alloy is also used to manufacture some military equipment, such as bunker support, mortar base, and missile. With the development of magnesium alloy research and the improvement of material properties, magnesium alloy will be used more and more in weapons.
Other applications
Magnesium alloy is widely used in other small areas in our life, such as motorcycles and bicycles. Bicycles are new applications of magnesium alloy, mainly used as a bicycle frame. Magnesium alloy has the advantages of not only light, fast and comfortable, but also small pipe diameter, thin pipe wall, and stronger frame. The folding bicycle frame made of magnesium alloy has a mass of only 1.4kg; one of the representative devices of rehabilitation facilities is a wheelchair. The wheelchair sold in the market can be divided into standard type and lightweight type (aluminum alloy or titanium alloy) according to the quality. The materials used are steel pipe, aluminum pipe, and titanium pipe. AZ31 magnesium alloy is used to make wheelchair frames or other parts except wheels are basically made of magnesium alloy. The wheelchair can be reduced by about 15%, which is light and flexible. Magnesium alloy is mainly used in marine instruments, underwater weapons, seawater batteries, diving suits, sacrificial anodes, timing devices, etc. There are numerous applications and play an important role in our lives.
