Dynamic response of 1-in. form factor disk drives to external shock and vibration loads

The dynamic response of the head disk interface is investigated numerically for two different designs of 1-in. hard disk drive enclosures, the so-called “thin” enclosure and the “thick” enclosure. First, the in-plane and out-of-plane vibration response is determined. Then, the effects of linear shock and head slap are studied. Simulation results show that the thinner enclosure has better performance with respect to forced vibrations in terms of reduced amplitude of slider vibrations. In addition, the effect of operational shock on the dynamic characteristics of textured and untextured sliders is studied. A finite element formulation of the time-dependent Reynolds equation (with Boltzmann slip flow correction) was used to obtain the air bearing response. The results show that the dynamic flying characteristics of textured sliders are improved compared to that of untextured sliders.