Another magnet ?

[gmann]

What's the difference between oriented and unoriented and why would one necessarily be prefered over the other?

 

[Yelly]

An oriented magnet has a preferred direction of magnetisation designed into it. If you know where you want the poles, you just design the orientation that way. You can essentially only get the magnet to then magnetise in the direction of orientation. Result is the strongest magnetism hence you don't need a huge hunk of alnico (sic) to get the desired amount of magnetism. Pretty much any commercial magnet is likely to be oriented. Ideal in a pup where you don't want to carve out any more wood than you have to.

Unoriented has no preferred direction and can be magnetised in any direction but comes up much weaker for the same size.

 

[gmann]

Thanks!

 

[LtKojak]

What's the difference between oriented and unoriented and why would one necessarily be prefered over the other?

Search Alnico in Wikipedia, then look for "isotropic" and "anisotropic".

There's everything you wanna know and then some.

HTH,