Western Digital Technologies, Inc.

International Business Machines Corporation

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies Netherlands B.v.

Western Digital (fremont), Inc.

Other

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies

Westren Digital Technologies, Inc.

Tzong-Shii Pan

Satya Prakash Arya

Yih-Jen Dennis Chen

Surya Narayan Pattanaik

Yanning Liu

Wing Chun Shum

Yiduo Zhang

Kia Moh Teo

Victor Wing Shum

Toshiki Hirano

Drew B Lawson

Hienminh Huu Le

Shufun Ho

Adisak Tokaew

Cliff C Zhang

William W Childers

Thomas R Albrecht

David W Albrecht

Darrell Dean Palmer

Wachira Puttichaem

Fernando A Magsombol

Randall George Simmons

Qinghua Zeng

Ta-Chang Fu

Francis C Lee

Long-Sheng Fan

William Don Huber

William W Brooks

Wesley LeRoy Hillman

Francis Chee-Shuen Lee

John E Sell

Victor Wing Chun Shum

Yu-Min Lee

Gunphai Prateepphaisan

John Thomas Contreras

Wayne Isami Imaino

Wayne Allen Bonin

Albert John Wallash

Fu-Ying Huang

A David Erpelding

Timothy C Reiley

Hiroyasu Tsuchida

James Howard Eaton

Akihiko Aoyagi

Rehan Ahmed Zakai

Yoshio Uematsu

Martin John McCaslin

Hitoshi Tsujino

John Edward Scura

Robert Nolan Payne

David E Fowler

Charles Mathew Mate

Yi Lu

Gregory Tran

Shinobu Hagiya

Ali Hosseinzadeh

Daniel T Nguyen

Shujun Tang

Yoshinobu Noguchi

Brian P Schott

Mukund Vijay

Tahir A Ali

Masahiko Katoh

Ming-Ching Tang

David I Berger

Chaivat Poparisut

Victor Wing Chung Shum

Victor (Wing Shum

Theerawat Petdee

Greg R Knodel

Maribel Castro

Haruki Nitta

Syahril Zainudin

An approach to a piezoelectric (PZT) device, such as a hard disk drive microactuator, includes one or more layers of poled PZT material, with top and bottom surfaces coupled with respective electrode layers coupled with a power source to drive the active PZT layer(s). The electrode layers have different thicknesses, where the particular thicknesses may be configured to mitigate the variation of out-of-plane motion or bending associated with operational variations in the z-height between a corresponding actuator arm and recording medium and, likewise, the phase variation of flexure vibration.

Piezoelectric-based microactuator arrangement for mitigating out-of-plane force and phase variation of flexure vibration

Disclosed herein are suspension assembly structures for data storage devices that include physical or virtual crossovers of the pairs of differential signal traces to improve immunity to crosstalk and other interference. In an embodiment, the suspension assembly structure comprises a first trace for carrying a first component of a current to a differential transducer on a slider, a second trace for carrying a second component of the current to the differential transducer on the slider, and third and fourth traces for providing a differential write current to a writer of the data storage device, wherein the first trace physically crosses over the second trace at a first distance from a tail of the suspension assembly structure.

Suspension adjacent-conductors differential-signal-coupling attenuation structures

A method for head stack assembly (HSA) rework is disclosed. A first head gimbal assembly (HGA) includes a first suspension attached to an arm of the HSA, and a first flexure tail that terminates in a first bonding region that is bonded to a flexible printed circuit (FPC) of the HSA. The first HGA is removed by cutting the first bonding region from a remainder of the first flexure tail and detaching the first suspension from the arm. The first bonding region of the first flexure tail is left bonded to the FPC. A replacement HGA includes a replacement suspension and a replacement flexure tail that terminates in a second bonding region. The replacement HGA is installed on the HSA by attaching the replacement suspension to the arm, overlaying the second bonding region on the first bonding region, and bonding the second bonding region to the first bonding region.

Method for head stack assembly rework

A head gimbal assembly has a laminate flexure that includes a metallic conductive layer that includes a plurality of electrically conductive traces that are elongated and narrow and electrically connected to the read head, and a metallic structural layer that is stiffer than the conductive layer. A first dielectric layer is disposed between the structural layer and the conductive layer. A second dielectric layer substantially covers the conductive layer in a flexure tail bonding region that overlaps a flexible printed circuit (FPC). The structural layer includes a plurality of flexure bond pads that are aligned with, facing, and bonded to corresponding FPC bond pads. The flexure bond pads in the structural layer are electrically connected to the electrically conductive traces in the conductive layer by vias through the first dielectric layer. In certain embodiments, the flexure tail is folded upon itself in the flexure tail bonding region.

Disk drive system

Head suspension having a flexure tail with a covered conductive layer and structural layer bond pads

A head gimbal assembly for a disk drive includes a flexure tail terminal region having flexure bond pads in electrical communication with the head. Each of the flexure bond pads includes a widened region of a corresponding one of a plurality of electrical traces in a conductive layer, and a discontinuous bond pad backing island in a structural layer that overlaps the widened region. The flexure tail terminal region also includes a plurality of discontinuous edge stiffener islands in the structural layer that do not overlap the widened region of any flexure bond pad, and that are disposed no more than 50 microns from one of the two opposing longitudinal outer edges of the flexure tail terminal region. At least one of the plurality of discontinuous bond pad backing islands is disposed no more than 50 microns from one of the two opposing longitudinal outer edges.

Disk drive head suspension tail with stiffened edge alignment features

A flexure tail of a head suspension assembly includes a structural layer, a conductive layer, a dielectric layer between the structural and conductive layers, and an insulative cover layer disposed on the conductive layer. The conductive layer includes a plurality of flexure bond pads in a terminal region of the flexure tail. The insulative cover layer includes a plurality of openings that expose each of the plurality of flexure bond pads. The dielectric layer defines a first thickness between the structural layer and the conductive layer at each of the plurality of flexure bond pads. The dielectric layer also defines a second thickness between the structural layer and the conductive layer adjacent to the plurality of flexure bond pads in the terminal region of the flexure tail. The second thickness is less than the first thickness by a thickness difference that is no less than a cover layer thickness.

Disk drive head gimbal assembly having a flexure tail with a dielectric layer that has regions of lesser thickness

A head stack assembly (HSA) includes a flexible printed circuit (FPC) having a mouth with an upper mouth edge and a lower mouth edge. The FPC includes a first plurality of conductive terminals immediately adjacent the upper mouth edge and a second plurality of conductive terminals immediately adjacent the lower mouth edge. The mouth is bisected by a mouth centerline that is substantially parallel to and substantially equidistant from first and second actuator arms of the HSA. A head gimbal assembly (HGA) is attached to each of the first and second actuator arms. Each HGA includes a flexure tail laminate having a dielectric layer disposed between a plurality of conductive traces and a structural layer. The plurality of conductive traces is electrically connected to either the first or second plurality of conductive terminals via a plurality of openings in the structural layer and in the dielectric layer.

Head stack assembly with a flexible printed circuit having a mouth centered between arms

A method for manufacturing a magnetic recording head slider is disclosed. A plurality of bond pads are formed in a linear arrangement adjacent one another on a trailing edge of a slider body. Each of the plurality of bond pads comprises a probe contact area and a soldering contact area with each area being laterally bounded in a width dimension, along the trailing edge, by respective edges of the pads wherein a width of the probe contact area is greater than a width of the soldering contact area of each respective pad whereby the probe contact area is larger than the soldering contact area.

Method of manufacturing a magnetic recording head slider comprising bond pad having a probe contact area and a solder contact area

A novel head stack assembly (HSA) is disclosed and claimed. The HSA includes a flexible printed circuit (FPC) having a mouth with an upper mouth edge and a lower mouth edge. The FPC includes a first plurality of conductive terminals immediately adjacent the upper mouth edge and a second plurality of conductive terminals immediately adjacent the lower mouth edge. The mouth defines and is bisected by a mouth centerline disposed equidistant from the upper mouth edge and the lower mouth edge. The mouth centerline is substantially parallel to and substantially equidistant from first and second actuator arms of the HSA. A first plurality of conductive traces of a first head gimbal assembly (HGA) is electrically connected to the first plurality of conductive terminals, and a second plurality of conductive traces of a second HGA is electrically connected to the second plurality of conductive terminals.

A method to manufacture a head stack assembly for a disk drive, the method comprising: attaching a head gimbal assembly that includes a flexure tail having flexure bond pads to an actuator that includes a flexible printed circuit (FPC) with FPC bond pads; folding each of the flexure bond pads upon itself such that the flexure tail is substantially thicker at each of the folded flexure bond pads; aligning the flexure bond pads with the FPC bond pads; introducing an adhesive material that includes electrically conductive beads of substantially similar size between each of the flexure bond pads and corresponding ones of the FPC bond pads; and bringing a thermode tool into contact with the flexure bond pads after folding, with the thermode tool pressing the flexure bond pads against the FPC bond pads for a period.

Method of manufacturing a disk drive head gimbal assembly having a flexure tail with folded bond pads

A disk drive suspension assembly has a load beam and a laminated flexure attached to the load beam. The laminated flexure includes a structural layer with a head mounting tongue, and first and second conductive layers. A first dielectric layer is disposed between the structural layer and the first conductive layer, and a second dielectric layer is disposed between the first conductive layer and the second conductive layer. The first conductive layer includes a first plurality of adjacent traces, and the second conductive layer includes a second plurality of adjacent traces that are staggered relative to the first plurality of adjacent traces. The adjacent traces of each plurality are electrically common and joined at a distal junction adjacent the head mounting tongue and joined at a proximal junction at the flexure tail terminal region.

Disk drive suspension assembly with flexure having dual conductive layers with staggered traces

A laminated structure includes a metallic layer, a dielectric layer on the metallic layer, wherein the dielectric layer and metallic layer have a slot formed therein, and one or more conductive traces on the dielectric layer opposite the metallic layer, wherein the ends of the one or more traces terminate to form bonding pads extending into the slot. A method of forming a slotted laminated structure includes forming a metallic layer, forming a dielectric layer on the metallic layer, forming a slot in the dielectric layer and metallic layer, and forming one or more electrically conductive traces on the dielectric layer opposite the metallic layer, wherein ends of the one or more traces are formed to terminate with bonding pads extending into the slot.

Laminated suspension flexure with open polyimide base

A disk drive head gimbal assembly (HGA) includes a distal region that includes a load beam dimple having a protruding convex surface. The HGA includes a laminated flexure having a structural layer with a tongue disposed between two outrigger beams. A piezoelectric element is adhered to the tongue. The tongue includes an actuated portion to which a read head may be adhered, and that is rotated about an axis of rotation by expansion of the piezoelectric element. The tongue also includes a non-actuated portion that is not rotated by expansion of the piezoelectric element. The non-actuated portion of the tongue adjoins and forms a bridge between the two outrigger beams. The bridge includes a flexure dimple that protrudes from the tongue and has a concave surface that is in contact with the convex surface of the load beam dimple.

Disk drive head suspension with a dual dimple and a flexure tongue with a piezoelectric microactuator

Growing community of inventors

San Jose, CA, United States of America

Tzong-Shii Pan