Abstract
The understanding of tribo- and electro-chemical phenomenons on the molecular level at a sliding interface is a field of growing interest. Fundamental chemical and physical insights of sliding surfaces are crucial for understanding wear at an interface, particularly for nano or micro scale devices operating at high sliding speeds. A complete investigation of the electrochemical effects on high sliding speed interfaces requires a precise monitoring of both the associated wear and surface chemical reactions at the interface. Here, we demonstrate that head-disk interface inside a commercial magnetic storage hard disk drive provides a unique system for such studies. The results obtained shows that the voltage assisted electrochemical wear lead to asymmetric wear on either side of sliding interface.
Highlights
The understanding of tribo- and electro-chemical phenomenons on the molecular level at a sliding interface is a field of growing interest
On the macroscale level many studies were conducted to understand the impact of chemical potential on surface oxidation[22,23,24], but at the nanoscale a quantitative understanding of its mechanism and impact on wear appears to be little understood
To understand the complex electrochemical reaction, we investigate the effect of environmental conditions on the passivation process
Summary
The understanding of tribo- and electro-chemical phenomenons on the molecular level at a sliding interface is a field of growing interest. At macro or micro scale it follows Archard’s law describing fracture and plastic deformation with wear volume being proportional to both the applied load and sliding distance[7,8,9] Such phenomena lead to catastrophic wear and are rare in nanoscale devices where the progressive chemically assisted wear is likely to be dominant. In a hard disk drive, the head has an embedded micro-scale heater which produces through thermal expansion a well-defined mechanical protrusion This allows to adjust the head-to-disk interference level within sub-nanometer precision over a contact area of several square micrometers. We show that the interface current decay sharply with time indicating the chemical passivation of the surface carbon dangling bonds that are created while sliding This unique approach provides an in-depth understanding of the electrochemically assisted wear at high sliding speeds which until now has never been applied to such devices
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