Study of aerodynamic characteristics in hard disk drives by numerical simulation

• Published in: IEEE transactions on magnetics Vol. 37; no. 2; pp. 831 - 836
• Main Authors: Shimizu, H., Tokuyama, M., Imai, S., Nakamura, S., Sakai, K.
• Format: Journal Article Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: New York, NY IEEE 01.03.2001; Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Aerodynamic forces; Aerodynamics; Analytical models; Applied sciences; Computational modeling; Computer simulation; Disk drives; Disks; Electronics; Equations; Exact sciences and technology; Friction; Hard disks; High speed; Lubricants; Magnetic devices; Magnetic heads; Magnetism; Numerical simulation; Other magnetic recording and storage devices (including tapes, disks, and drums); Power consumption; Semiconductor electronics. Microelectronics. Optoelectronics. Solid state devices; Stress; Vibration; Rotating disk; Dragging; Theoretical study; Numerical simulation; Magnetic disk; Hard disk; Magnetic recording
• ISSN: 0018-9464; 1941-0069
• DOI: 10.1109/20.917625

The behavior of the air flow inside a hard disk drive is evaluated by a three-dimensional unsteady-flow analysis technique called large eddy simulation (LES). The simulation shows that the fluctuation of the aerodynamic force is strongly correlated with the amplitude of the disk vibration, which causes positioning error of the read/write head. It also shows that the power loss caused by the friction of the air on the disks, which accounts for most of the power consumption of hard disk drives at a high-speed revolution, can be qualitatively predicted.