Partial contact air bearing characteristics of tripad sliders for proximity recording

Proximity recording introduces some new head/disk interface characteristics as compared to the conventional noncontact recording. The different design philosophy has led to several distinct partial contact tripad air bearing designs, including the shaped rail negative pressure and straight rail positive pressure tripad sliders. The impact of these new characteristics and design differences on the head/disk reliability needs to be thoroughly understood in order to ensure a successful proximity recording. This paper investigates the partial contact air bearing characteristics of three representative tripad slider designs. The contact stiffness is used as a measure of the air bearing compliance. Simulations of the fly height, contact force, altitude sensitivity, substrate waviness induced spacing and contact force modulations, contact take-off, track seeking and crash stop dynamics are performed for the three tripad slider designs. the results demonstrate that the negative pressure tripad sliders can be designed such that they can achieve both flat fly height and contact force profiles and, fast take-off, while still maintaining a small contact stiffness. However, the air bearing compliance and waviness following performance have to be compromised for the correct partial contact air bearing pitch stiffness.