An active head slider using a piezoelectric cantilever for in situ flying-height control

Author

Suzuki, Kenji ; Maeda, Ryutaro ; Chu, Jiaru ; Kato, Takahisa ; Kurita, Masayuki

Author_Institution

Dept. of Eng. Synthesis, Univ. of Tokyo, Japan

Volume

39

Issue

2

fYear

2003

fDate

3/1/2003 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

826

Lastpage

831

Abstract

This paper describes design and fabrication of active head sliders using PZT thin films for in situ flying-height control. Silicon sliders with piezoelectric unimorph cantilevers were fabricated monolithically using micromachining process. The deflection of 70 nm was obtained at the tip of the 0.6-mm-long cantilever with a drive voltage of 4 V. Furthermore, an air-bearing surface design that makes it possible to reduce the aerodynamic lift force under the head is discussed.

Keywords

aerodynamics; disc drives; hard discs; lead compounds; machine bearings; microactuators; micromachining; piezoelectric actuators; 0.6 mm; 4 V; PZT; active head slider; aerodynamic lift force; air-bearing surface design; deflection; drive voltage; hard disk drives; in situ flying-height control; microactuators; micromachining process; piezoelectric cantilever; piezoelectric unimorph cantilevers; Aerodynamics; Electrostatic actuators; Fabrication; Hard disks; Magnetic heads; Microactuators; Piezoelectric actuators; Piezoelectric films; Power engineering and energy; Transistors;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Magnetics, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9464

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TMAG.2003.808934

Filename

1190109