Digital Equipment Corporation

Quantum Corporation

Frank W Bernett

Christopher Anthony Pollard

Charles M Riggle

John D Read

Peter R Svendsen

Tave J Fruge

R Bruce Gifford

William B Noe

Michael C Strzepa

William Ray

Tom E MacDonald

Richard Winfrey

Michael A Brown

A spindle shaft attachment technique for a disk drive includes a conical tip formed on, or added to, the top of the spindle shaft in order that it might be embedded in or contact a substantially planar, interior surface of the HDA cover at a location determined by the perpendicularity of the spindle as set by the baseplate without forcing the top of the spindle shaft to a predetermined screw hole or recessed cone location on the cover. The spindle shaft attachment technique disclosed allows for use of a relatively longer spindle shaft for a given height form factor drive and, therefore, allows a greater spacing between upper and lower spindle bearings resulting in greater stiffness and an increased rocking mode frequency.

Improved spindle shaft for attaching a cover in a disk drive

A disk drive having attenuated vibrations for improved disk drive performance. The disk drive has first and second viscoelastic dampers effective in attenuating vibrations during operation of the disk drive.

Damping configuration for improved disk drive performance

A disk drive data storage device in which the space between adjacent disks is minimized. The disk drive comprises an actuator, a plurality of arm assemblies and at least two disks mounted on a spindle for rotation at a desired speed. Each arm assembly comprises an arm member, one end of which is integrally connected to the actuator and a head flexure assembly connected to the other end of said arm member. A pair of arm assemblies are positioned between each pair of disks with the arm assemblies lying in substantially the same horizontal plane but one arm assembly having a landing zone at the outside diameter of one of the disks and the other arm assembly having a landing zone at the inside diameter of the other one of the disks. The disk drive is assembled using a split baseplate with the actuator mounted on one portion of the baseplate and the spindle/disk assembly mounted on the other portion of the baseplate.

Process of assembling a disk drive with minimum spacing between disks

A method and apparatus for providing a dynamic fine track seeking operation that adaptively fine tunes the entrance criteria used to determine when the head is on track for the specific disc drive under actual operating conditions. The method and apparatus includes adaptively modifying entrance criteria individually for each head in a disc drive according to actual operating conditions with the use of stored entrance criteria for each head, an extra track proximity threshold and a successful entrance counter.

Methods and apparatus for optimizing track seeking operations

A tuned vibration absorber comprises a laminated constrained layer beam formed from at least two rigid plates joined together by a layer of elastomer. One end of the laminated structure is mounted in a rigid base so that the laminated structure forms a cantilever constrained layer beam. The lamianted constrained beam is constructed so as to vibrate normal to the laminated structure at a resonance frequency that is to be dampened. The elastomer layer converts the vibrational kinetic energy into heat so that the heat can be removed. An array of tuned vibration absorbers is formed so as to damp a wide range of frequencies. The resonance frequencies of the tuned vibration absorbers are regularly spaced about the resonance frequency. The tuned array vibration absorber thus absorbs some of the vibrational kinetic energy and disperses the remainder over a wide range of frequencies to reduce the maximum amplitude of the vibrations that occur at any one frequency.

Tuned array vibration absorber

A baffle assembly comprises a series of parallel baffle plates positioned adjacent to and coplanar with the respective disks mounted on a spindle of a disk drive. The baffle plates help maintain parallel air flow across each disk edge thereby reducing turbulence at the disk edge. This reduces the vertical vibratory motion of the positioning arm holding the transducer head slider suspension assembly which in turn reduces the horizontal or cross-track motion of the head.

Disk extender baffles

A rotary actuator assembly for positioning read/write heads in disk drive mass storage systems. The actuator assembly includes an actuator motor and one or more actuator arms secured thereto. The motor provides rotary motion of the arms, to move the heads. The stator magnet of the motor is an electromagnet wound on an arcuate core; a pair of elongate permanent magnets are attached to the rotor member, for coaction with the stator magnet. The rotor member has a U-shaped cross sectional area in a plane perpendicular to its axis of rotation; the permanent magnets are fixed to the outside, bottom corners of the U and the actuator arms are mounted across the open end of the U. The rotor is of a very small radius, to minimize inertia. The permanent magnets have a flat face facing the stator, with a channel running longitudinally down the middle, to minimize flux density variations in the permanent magnet-coil gap. The rotor balances the arm relative to the rotor's axis. The arms are of a substantially symmetrical tapered truss design, presenting low inertia; each is cantilevered to the rotor by one bolt which is passed through and pulls the arm against the rotors. Additionally, a spirol-type cylindrical spiral spring, received in a slot in the arm, prevents lateral slippage of the arm relative to the rotor. A pair of cantilevered leaf spring crash stops fixed to the stator decelerate the rotor at the ends of its range of travel.

Rotary actuator assembly for disk drive head positioner

A housing assembly (1-10) for multiple disks (1-12) used in a disk mass information storage unit in a data processing system. The housing includes fixed baffles (2-84, 86) proximate the outer disk surfaces in the housing to substantially reduce temperature differentials among the disk surfaces.

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Colorado Springs, CO, United States of America

Frank W Bernett