An assessment of transmission efficiency on a hard disk’s vibration

¹ Department of Mechanical Engineering, Tatung University, No.40, Sec. 3, Zhonshan N. Rd., Taipei City 104, Taiwan, R.O.C.
² Department of Mechanical and Automation Engineering, Chung Chou University of Science and Technology, R.O.C., No. 6, Lane 2, Sec. 3, Shanjiao Rd., Yuanlin City, Changhua County 510, Taiwan,

^* Corresponding author: minchie.chiu@msa.hinet.net

Abstract

At present, there is a trend to design a hard disk with a larger capacity, a faster revolution speed, and a precise mechanism. Therefore, the influence of data transmission with respect to vibration is obvious. To reduce interference of the vibrational impact on the data transmission efficiency, vibrational abatement on the hard disk using the damping material becomes crucial. Because of the complicated relationship for the damping coefficient and spring constant to the hardness (D1, D2, and D3) of the damping material installed under the hard disk, it is difficult to theoretically assess an optimal hardness combination of the damping material. Therefore, an alternative way by using an experimental study in conjunction with Taguchi method, an Artificial Neural Network (ANN), and a GA Method is proposed. In this paper, a hard disk is placed on a vibration tester that is an analogue to a dynamic vibrational circumstance induced by a vibrational base. The data transfer rate of the hard disk will be detected by using IOmeter software under various base-excitation accelerations, tilted angles of the hard disk, and targeted frequencies. To reduce the vibrational impact on the data transmission efficiency, an assessment of an optimal three-layer damping material installed under the hard disk using the Taguchi method, the Artificial Neural Network (ANN), and the GA Method is proposed. Before the optimization of the damping material is performed, the required experimental sets (the hardness for three layers of damping material) of the data transmission testing with respect to various design parameters will be determined by using the Taguchi method. The ANN, a simplified objective function (OBJ), will be established by inputting the hardness of three layers of damping material and their related data transmission efficiency at three targeted frequencies. Thereafter, the optimal hardness for three layers of the damping material will be obtained using a genetic algorithm (GA). Consequently, the optimal hardness of the three-layer damping material with respect to various tilted angles and target frequencies will be assessed.