Abstract
Various types of latch designs for hard disk drives using load/unload mechanism have been introduced to protect undesired release motions of a voice coil motor(VCM) actuator from sudden disturbances. Recently, various inertia-type latches have been widely used because locking performance is better than that of other types of latch. However there has been a limit in the inertia type in order to guarantee perfect latch and unlatch operations because of changes in latch/unlatch conditions due to mechanical tolerance and temperature-dependent friction. In this paper, a reliable and robust magnetic latch mechanism is proposed through only simple modifications of coil and yoke shapes in order to overcome the mechanical limit of current inertia-type latches. This new magnetic latch does not have only a simple structure but it also ensures reliable operations and anti-shock performance. The operating mechanism of the proposed latch is theoretically analyzed and optimally designed using an electromagnetic simulation.
