Abstract
To increase the recording density of magnetic disk drives, the reduction of spacing between the flying slider and the rotating disk is of great importance. When the spacing between the slider and the disk approximates the molecular mean-free path, intermittent contacts between slider and disk are more likely to occur. One critical challenge for modern magnetic disk drive is the ability to achieve stable and small spacing between the read/write head and data storage media. In this paper, we describe an experiment to identify the factors contributing to the dynamics stability and present the experimental results. Two types of slider design are selected to investigate the ambient pressure effect on touch-down and take-off of air bearing slider in the head/disk interface.
