The aim of this paper is to develop a general methodology for the optimum design of magnetic head sliders in improving the spacing characteristics between a slider and disk surface under static and dynamic operating conditions of hard disk drives and to present an application of the methodology to the IBM 3380-type slider design. To generate the optimal design variables, the objective function is defined as the weighted sum of the minimum spacing, the maximum difference in the spacing due to variation of the radial location of the head, and the maximum amplitude ratio of the slider motion. Slider rail width, taper length, taper angle, suspension position, and preload are selected as the design variables. Before the optimization of the head, the effects of these five design variables on the objective function are examined by a parametric study, and then the optimum design variables are determined by applying the hybrid optimization technique, combining the direct search method and successive quadratic programming. From the obtained results, the effectiveness of optimum design on the spacing characteristics of magnetic heads is clarified. [S0742-4787(00)03701-2]

1.
Ono
,
K.
,
1975
, “
Dynamic Characteristics of Air-Lubricated Slider Bearing for Noncontact Magnetic Recording
,”
ASME J. Lubr. Technol.
,
97
, No.
2
, pp.
250
260
.
2.
Kogure
,
K.
,
Fukui
,
S.
,
Mitsuya
,
Y.
, and
Kaneko
,
R.
,
1983
, “
Design of Negative Pressure Slider for Magnetic Recording Disks
,”
ASME J. Lubr. Techol.
,
105
, No.
3
, pp.
496
502
.
3.
White
,
J. W.
,
1983
, “
Flying Characteristics of the Zero-Load Slider Bearing
,”
ASME J. Lubr. Technol.
105
, No.
3
, pp.
484
490
.
4.
White, J. W., 1984, “Flying Characteristics of the 3370-Type Slider on a 5 1/4-inch disk—Part I: Static analysis,” ASLE SP-16, Tribology and Mechanics of Magnetic Storage Systems, 1, pp. 72–76.
5.
White, J. W., 1986, “An Air Bearing Slider with Uniform Flying Height and Fast Take-off Characteristics,” ASLE SP-21, Tribology and Mechanics of Magnetic Storage Systems, 3, pp. 95–101.
6.
Nishihara, H. S., Dorius, L. K., Bolasna, S. A., and Best, G. L., 1988, “Performance Characteristics of the IBM 3380K Air Bearing Design,” STLE SP-25, Tribology and Mechanics of Magnetic Storage Systems, 5, pp. 117–123.
7.
Hashimoto, H., 1997a, “Optimization of Oil Flow Rate and Oil Film Temperature Rise in High Speed Hydrodynamic Journal Bearings,” Proceedings of the 24th Leeds-Lyon Symposium on Tribology, pp. 205–210.
8.
O’Hara
,
M. A.
, and
Bogy
,
D. B.
,
1995
, “
Robust Design Optimization Techniques for Ultra-Low Flying Sliders
,”
IEEE Transactions on Magnetics
,
31
, No.
6
, pp.
2955
2957
.
9.
O’Hara
,
M. A.
,
Hu
,
Y.
, and
Bogy
,
D. B.
,
1996
, “
Effects of Slider Sensitivity Optimization
,”
IEEE Transactions on Magnetics
,
32
, No.
5
, pp.
3744
3746
.
10.
Lu
,
S.
,
Hu
,
Y.
,
O’Hara
,
M.
,
Bogy
,
D. B.
,
Bhatia
,
C. S.
, and
Hsia
,
Y.-T.
,
1996
, “
Air Bearing Design, Optimization, Stability Analysis and Verification for Sub-25 nm Flying
,”
IEEE Transactions on Magnetics
,
32
, No.
1
, pp.
103
109
.
11.
Bogy
,
D. B.
,
Lu
,
S.
,
O’Hara
,
M. A.
, and
Zhang
,
S.
,
1998
, “
Some Advanced Air-Bearing Design Issues for Proximity Recording
,”
ASME J. Tribol.
,
120
, No.
3
, pp.
566
570
.
12.
Hashimoto
,
H.
, and
Kato
,
Y.
,
1987
, “
A Study of the Characteristic Analysis of High-Speed Journal Bearings (Optimum Design of Journal Bearings)
,”
JSME International Journal
,
30
, No.
262
, pp.
632
637
.
13.
Hashimoto
,
H.
,
1997b
, “
Optimum Design of High-Speed, Short Journal Bearings by Mathematical Programming
,”
STLE Tribology Transactions
,
40
, No.
2
, pp.
283
293
.
14.
Fukui
,
S.
, and
Kaneko
,
R.
,
1988
, “
Analysis of Ultra-Thin Gas Film Lubrication Based on Linearized Boltzmann Equation: First Report—Derivation of a Generalized Lubrication Equation Including Thermal Creep Flow
,”
ASME J. Tribol.
,
110
, No.
2
, pp.
253
261
.
15.
Fukui
,
S.
, and
Kaneko
,
R.
,
1990
, “
A Database for Interpolation of Poiseuille Flow Rates for High Knudsen Number Lubrication Problems
,”
ASME J. Tribol.
,
112
, No.
1
, pp.
78
83
.
16.
Kang
,
S.-C.
,
Crone
,
R. M.
, and
Jhon
,
M. S.
,
1999
, “
A New Molecular Gas Lubrication Theory Suitable for Head-Disk Interface Modeling
,”
J. Appl. Phys.
,
85
, pp.
5594
5596
.
17.
Ruiz
,
O. J.
, and
Bogy
,
D. B.
,
1990
, “
A Numerical Simulation of the Head-Disk Assembly in Magnetic Hard Disk Files: Part I—Component Models
,”
ASME J. Tribol.
,
112
, No.
4
, pp.
593
602
.
You do not currently have access to this content.