Magnetic head suspension assembly fabricated with integral load beam and flexure

Abstract

A magnetic head suspension assembly is fabricated with an integral piece which includes a load beam section, a flexure section, a rest mount section and a leaf spring section between the load beam and rear mount. A tongue extends from the load beam to the flexure and has a down-facing load dimple which contacts the non-air bearing surface of an attached air bearing slider. The flexure includes narrow thin legs adjacent to a cutout that delineates the load beam tongue. The head suspension is characterised by a high first bending mode frequency and low pitch and roll stiffness.

Description

its relatively narrow end into the flexure section 12. The tongue 14 is delineated by a U-shaped cutout 16 in the flexure section. the relatively narrow end of the load beam section into a shaped opening 16 of flexure section 12. The tongue 14 delineates the U-shape of the opening 16. The load beam tongue 14 provides low deflections in the direction orthogonal to the plane of the load beam section and flexure section by virtue of its short length and low gram load force.

A constrained layer damping element 19 made of elastomer 10A about 0.002 inch thick and an overlay 10B of about 0.002 inch thick stainless steel is laid down on the top surface of the major section of the load beam to minimize undesirable resonances of the suspension, as shown in FIG. 1. Alternatively, a similar damping element 21 may be deposited on the bottom surface of the load beam without interfering with the flexure 12, as shown in FIG. 3.

The flexure section 12 includes narrow legs 32 that are located adjacent to the sides of the U-shaped cutout 16. The flexure legs 32 flexure beams 32 defined by shaped opening 16. The flexure beams 32 are chemically etched to a thickness of about 0.0010 inch for increased flexibility. The flexure beams 32 are narrow, narrow legs 32 are thin and relatively weak to allow the desired gimbaling action about the load dimple 13 and also to allow the suspension to have low roll and pitch stillness. A lateral connecting part or ear 38 transverse section 38 is formed with the integral flat load beam and flexure to connect ends of the narrow legs 32. flexure beams 32.

In this implementation of the invention, a slider 22 is bonded to the lateral connecting part 38. A hemispherical load dimple 18 is formed on the load beam tongue 14 and is in contact with the top non-air bearing surface of an air bearing slider 22 that is bonded to the lateral part or ear 38. transverse section 38. The load dimple 18 is formed so that the hemisphere of the dimple faces down to the slider. The dimple 18 may be offset, 0-0.006 inch for example, from the centerline of the slider in order to control flying height characteristics.

U-shaped flanges 24 extend along the sides of the load beam section and are truncated before reaching the flexure section 12. The flanges 24 contribute to the stillness of the load beam section and localizes the bending action to the spring section 56, thereby minimizing the pitch attitude changes due to arm/disk vertical tolerances. Head circuitry wiring 92 without the conventional tubing is located within the channels of the flanges 24. The absence of tubing allows the U-shaped channels of the flanges 24 to be relatively shallow thereby contributing to the reduction of the Z-height of the head suspension assembly. Adhesive material 90 is used to maintain the wiring 92 fixed in place. Adhesive fillets 91 are provided adjacent to the ear 38 transverse section 38 and the slider 22. The fillets 91 are exposed and thus can be cured easily by application of ultraviolet radiation.

In a disk drive using this hand suspension and slider assembly, flexing occurs between the load beam tongue 14 and the flexure legs 32. With this design, the load force is transferred through the tongue 14 to the truncated conical section of the load beam. This integral load beam/flexure configuration allows the separation of the applied load transfer force from the gimbal action so that the structure may be made stiff at the load beam for proper bending and relatively weak about the load dimple to allow proper pitch and roll of the slider.

A feature of the head suspension and slider assembly disclosed herein is that the slider 22 is configured with a step 28, which is formed by cutting a recessed portion or platform 30 on the non-air bearing top surface of the slider 22. The Z-height of the step 28 is substantially the same as the Z-height of the hemispherical load dimple 18. Sufficient spacing is provided between the load beam tongue 14 and the top slider surface to allow free gimbaling action of the slider 22 with no interference from the load beam. The slider step 28 is sufficiently high so that the slider end at the trailing edge can accommodate a thin film magnetic transducer including its coil turns.

The leaf spring 56 between the load beam section 10 and the rear mount section 42 is formed with a trapezoidal-like cutout opening 60 to provide flexibility. The flexible section 56 is formed to provide a desired load force that counteracts the aerodynamic lift force generated by the rotating disk during operation of the disk drive. The load force arises from bending the suspension from the phantom position, shown in FIG. 2, to the raised position as indicated by the arrow.

The rear mount section 42 of the load beam 10 bas a hole 48 to allow connection of a swage plate 46 to the suspension by means or a boss 48 and by laser welding. The swage plate 46 provides stiffness to the rear mount section 42. Rear flanges 54 provide wire routing channels to protect the wires during handling.

The head suspension and slider assembly described herein incorporates a stiff load beam and a relatively long and narrow flexure which includes thin weak flexure legs and connecting lateral part. With this design, low bending stiffness and high lateral and longitudinal stiffness with low roll and pitch stiffness are realized. The load beam tongue has a high vertical or perpendicular stiffness so that there is minimal bending of the load beam tongue up or down relative to the plane of the suspension. The first bending mode resonant frequency or vibration is substantially higher than known prior art suspension designs of comparable size.

In an actual implementation of this invention, the overall height of the slider is about 0.0110 inch, its length about 0.0400 inch, and its width about 0.020 inch. The height of the step 28 is about 0.0015 inch above the recessed portion 30 which is 0.0336 inch long. The surface area or the top of the step 28 it preferably minimized in size to reduce the effects of bending or warping at the surface of the slider step which may occur due to the difference in the thermal coefficients of expansion of the ceramic slider 22 and the stainless steel ear 38. transverse section 38. Such bending would affect the flying characteristics of the head adversely.

In an alternative embodiment of the head suspension, illustrated in part in FIGS. 6A-7, the flexure section 62 is formed with a tongue 64 and a cutout 66. shaped opening 66. A down-facing load dimple 76 is provided on the tongue 64. Narrow etched legs 68 Narrow, thinly etched flexure beams 68 that extend from the load beam 10 are connected by a transverse part 70. The legs 68 flexure beams 68 are chemically etched to be thinner than the integral flat piece used to form the load beam and flexure sections. Outriggers 72 forming a split tongue are provided at the sides of the flexure 62 and are separated from the thin legs 68 by cutouts 74. flexure beams 68 by spaces 74. The outriggers 72 overhang the sides of the slider 22 and the slider is fastened to the outriggers by an adhesive fillet 90. adhesive fillets 61. In this implementation, the top non-air bearing surface 20 of the slider 22 is bonded to the outriggers 72 by adhesive fillets which provide bond strength at the cutout 16, 61 which provide bond strength as shown in FIG. 6C. The slider 22 is mounted to the outriggers 72 so that the center of the slider is aligned with the load dimple 76, and the slider projects beyond the end of the transverse part 70. There is no offset of the load dimple 76 relative to the centerline of the slider. With this implementation, a lower vertical height (Z-height) is realized. Also the slider bonding areas of the outriggers 72 are larger than the bonding area of the lateral connecting part 38 of flexure 12 of FIG. 1. In this implementation, there is little room to move the slider toward the leading edge relative to the load dimple, which may be necessary to obtain optimal flying attitude. Also, additional forming is required in order to bend the two outrigger legs 72 down to the bend 20, which increases the tolerance during production.

FIG. 8 shows a paddleboard or fret 80 formed from a stainless steel piece that has been stamped with a number of head suspensions 82, each of which was formed with the design shown in FIG. 1. Tooling holes 84 and support legs 86 are provided for further handling. FIG. 8A shows the paddleboard 80 with support legs 86 bent to enable working on the extremely small femtoslider suspensions.

FIG. 9 shows a nanoslider suspension such as disclosed in copending application Ser. No. 07/926,033. The nanoslider includes a load beam 94, flexure 96, load beam tongue 98, spring section 100, rear mount section 102 and slider 104.

FIGS. 10 and 11 illustrate the femtoslider suspension of this invention with the load beam 10, flexure 12, spring section 56 and a rear section having a tooling hole 106. The tooling hole section 106 is attached to an extension 108 formed with an apertured swage 110 that allows attachment to a rotary actuator. In effect for extremely small drives, such as 1.3 inch and smaller, the extension 108 serves as an arm pivot and precludes the need for a separate arm structure, as used in the prior art. The extension 108 also allows the assembly to match the overall length of other industry standard “70%” microslider suspensions, thereby making it easy to use existing tooling.

FIG. 11 shows the suspension skewed with relation to the extension 108 to compensate for skew experienced as the head moves between the outer diameter and the inner diameter of the disk during accessing. The extension may include apertures 112 for weight reduction, as shown in FIGS 10 and 11. The apertures 112 serve to adjust for resonant conditions and/or to adjust for total actuator balance about the pivot.

FIG. 12 illustrates the femtoslider suspension without the extension and shows the large difference size between the nanoslider and femtoslider suspensions. In an implementation of the femtoslider, the length was about 0.395 inch and the greatest width was about 0.056 inch.

With reference to FIGS. 13 and 13A, a head slider suspension includes flat side tabs 120 which protrude to enable loading and unloading of the head suspension assembly relative to the surface of a magnetic disk in a disk drive. The side tabs may be present on one or both sides of the load beam. The side tabs 120 are moved by means of a tool for lifting or lowering the suspension assembly. The addition of the flat side tabs which are in the same plane as the load beam does not add to the vertical Z-height of the suspension assembly.

FIGS. 14A-C depict a partial suspension assembly having a slider 122 and a thin film transducer 124 at a slider end. The slider 222 has a flat top surface 126 on which the load dimple 76 is seated. The slider 122 is not formed with a step 78, as shown in the slider design of FIG. 7. The flat surface 124 extends across the entire top of the slider. However, the front end of the flexure 128 is bent at section 130 and 132, as shown in FIG. 14B to allow the flexure to come down by a distance substantially equivalent to the height of the load dimple 76. In this way, the flexure 128 contacts the flat top surface 126 of the slider 122. The slider is bonded to the bent sections 130 and 132 by adhesive fillets 134 and 136. The flat contact surfaces of flexure 128 and flat surface 125 at the top of the slider are also bonded together by adhesive. By using a flat surface slider, the slider requires less machining, thus realizing a savings in time and labor costs as sell as a reduction in possible breakage and error during production.

By virtue of this invention, a single integral piece is formed with a load beam and flexure, thereby realizing a significant savings in material and labor. Alignment of the load beam and flexure and welding of the separate parts are eliminated. Certain critical tolerances that were required in former load beam/flexure assemblies are no longer needed thereby enhancing the assembly process. The design allows the separation of the load transfer function from the gimbaling action which eliminates the weak bending characteristic found with prior art suspensions. It should be understood that the parameters, dimensions and materials, among other things, may be modified within the scope of the invention. For example, the slider design with the step and platform configuration disclosed herein can be used with a “50” nanoslider suspension or other size suspensions.

Claims

1. A magnetic head suspension assembly including an air bearing slider and at least one transducer disposed on said slider for transducing data that is recorded and read out from a surface of a rotating magnetic disk drive comprising:

a single integral planar piece of a specified thickness comprising,

a load beam section formed with a narrowed end;

a flexure section formed with two spaced narrow legs defining a cutout portion therebetween, said legs extending from said narrowed end of said load beam section, and a lateral ear spaced from said load beam section connecting said legs;

a tongue extending from said end of said narrowed load beam section, said tongue being disposed between said legs of said flexure section, said tongue having a free end within said flexure section, said tongue being formed with a load dimple;

said air bearing slider being bonded to said lateral ear and in contact with said load dimple;

whereby load transfer is effectively separated from the gimballing action of said slider so that pitch and roll stiffness is effectively reduced.

2. An assembly as in claim 1, wherein said head slider has a top non-air bearing surface attached to said flexure section.

3. An assembly as in claim 2, including means formed with said lateral ear for supporting said attached head slider.

4. An assembly as in claim 3, wherein said supporting means comprises outriggers or a split tongue.

5. An assembly as in claim 3, wherein said supporting means comprises said lateral ear that connects said narrow legs.

6. An assembly as in claim 2, wherein said slider is about 0.0110 inch high, 0.0400 inch long and 0.0200-0.0260 inch wide.

7. An assembly as in claim 2, wherein said top non-air bearing surface of said slider is formed with a platform and step adjacent to said platform.

8. An assembly as in claim 7, wherein said platform of said slider is about 0.0336 inch long and said step is about 0.0015 inch high.

9. An assembly as in claim 2, including a load dimple formed in said tongue.

10. An assembly as in claim 9, wherein said load dimple is hemispherical in shape and faces down into contact with said top surface of said slider.

11. An assembly as in claim 1, wherein said single integral planner piece including said tongue is about 0.0012 to 0.0015 inch thick and said narrow legs are about 0.0010 inch thick.

12. An assembly as in claim 1, wherein said load beam section is shaped as a truncated triangle.

13. An assembly as in claim 1, including a mount section at the rear end of said load beam section for enabling mounting said suspension to an actuator arm; and

a leaf spring section between said rear mount section and said load beam section for providing flexibility to said suspension.

14. An assembly as in claim 13, including a swage plate joined to said mount section for providing rigidity to said rear end of said suspension assembly.

15. An assembly as in claim 13, including front flanges formed along the edges of said load beam section and rear flanges formed along the edges of said rear mount section with a hiatus between said front and rear flanges.

16. An assembly as in claim 15, wherein said front flanges are formed with shallow U-shaped channels, and electrical wiring without tubing is positioned within said channels.

17. An assembly as in claim 13, including a cutout in said leaf spring section for providing flexibility to said suspension.

18. An assembly as in claim 1, further including an apertured extension formed at the rear end of said suspension assembly for enabling attachment to an actuator of a disk drive without a separate head arm to enable pivoting of said suspension assembly.

19. An assembly as in claim 1, including a damping material on said load beam.

20. An assembly as in claim 1, including at least one load/unload tab formed at the sides of said load beam section.

21. An assembly as in claim 2, wherein said top non-air bearing surface is substantially flat.

22. An assembly as in claim 21, wherein said lateral ear includes bent sections for contacting with said top surface of said slider.

23. Apparatus for supporting a slider comprising:

a single piece of elongated material of a first thickness, the single piece of elongated material having a distal end and a proximate end:

a shaped opening in the single piece of elongated material adjacent the distal end; the shaped opening defining;

a transverse section disposed at the distal end of the single piece of elongated material, the transverse section having a slider mounting surface;

first and second flexure beams connected to the transverse section, the first and second flexure beams having a second thickness that is less than the first thickness;

a tongue that extends between the first and second flexure beams, the tongue including a load point protrusion that extends in a direction substantially normal to a bottom surface of the tongue.

24. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein the second thickness is approximately 0.0010 inches.

25. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein the transverse section, the first and second flexure beams, and the tongue lie in the same general plane.

26. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein the load point protrusion is disposed along a centerline extending between the first and second flexure beams.

27. The apparatus of claim 23, wherein the load point protrusion is offset a distance from a centerline extending between the first and second flexure beams.

28. The apparatus of claim 27, wherein the distance is greater than zero inches, but less than or equal to 0.006 inches.

29. Apparatus for supporting a slider comprising:

a single piece of elongated material of a first thickness, the single piece of elongated material having a distal end and a proximate end;

a shaped opening in the single piece of elongated material adjacent the distal end; the shaped opening defining:

a transverse section disposed at the distal end of the single piece of elongated material, the transverse section having a slider mounting surface;

first and second flexure beams connected to the transverse section;

a tongue that extends between the first and second flexure beams, the tongue including a load point protrusion that extends in a direction substantially normal to a bottom surface of the tongue; and

wherein the transverse section, the first and second flexure beams, and the tongue lie in the same general plane.

30. The apparatus of claim 29, wherein the first and second flexure beams have a second thickness that is less than the first thickness.

31. The apparatus of claim 30, wherein the second thickness is approximately 0.0010 inches.

32. The apparatus of claim 29, wherein the load point protrusion is disposed along a centerline extending between the first and second flexure beams.

33. The apparatus of claim 29, wherein the load point protrusion is offset a distance from a centerline extending between the first and second flexure beams.

34. The apparatus of claim 33, wherein the distance is greater than zero inches, but less than or equal to 0.006 inches.

35. The apparatus of claim 29, wherein the shaped opening is U-shaped.