Numerical Quasi-Static Analysis of Ultralow Flying Slider During Track-Seeking Motion Over Discrete Track Media

It is important to accurately estimate the flying height (FH) of the ultralow flying slider in hard disk drive (HDD). Especially, during the track-seeking motion, the FH can change by the motion from inner diameter (ID) to outer diameter (OD) and vice versa. The FH variation induced by the track-seeking motion happens over discrete track media (DTM). Therefore, the FH variation during track-seeking is an important issue and it certainly should be considered for DTM. In this research, we performed the track-seeking simulation using quasi-static approximation to reduce the computation time. The effects on groove depth, width, and pitch with the effective skew angle taken into account were investigated with the simulation. As a result, we calculated the absolute change in FH as a function of the effective skew angle and groove depth. Finally, we proposed that the model that considers the effective skew angle over DTM should be adopted in the track-seeking motion-studies.