Initiation of sliding wear of the head-disk interface at very low rotational velocity

The initiation of sliding wear, typical of interactions at the head-disk interface, has been studied at very low rotational velocity. Wear features have been found on the surface of carbon-coated standard rigid disk media after only one pass without significant change being observed in the average friction force. The depth of typical wear features is estimated to be much greater than the thickness of the carbon overcoat. The accumulation of particles around the gap region on the head surface was also observed. The experimental results show that sliding wear during the initial stage of very low rotational velocity drag experiments is governed by molecular-mechanical interaction