Disk drive filter including fluorinated and non-fluorinated nanopourous organic framework materials

Description

BACKGROUND

The performance and reliability of a hard disk drive may be adversely affected by volatile contaminants that may be generated from disk or spindle lubricant, carbon, pivot oil, and other sources. For example, such contaminants may migrate to the head-disk interface where they can undesirably increase head-disk spacing and/or have adverse tribological effects. Activated carbon has been used within hard disk drive enclosures to help control contaminants. Desiccants also have been used within hard disk drive enclosures to control internal moisture.

However, activated carbon may not adequately adsorb certain hydrocarbons, siloxane, and fluorinated volatile organic compounds that are of particular prevalence or importance in disk drive applications. Therefore, there is a need in the art for a disk drive filter design that can better adsorb the specific contaminates that are expected to be generated within the disk drive enclosure and/or to be important within the disk drive enclosure.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a top perspective view of a disk drive capable of including an embodiment of the present invention, with the disk drive top cover in place.

FIG. 2 is a top perspective view of a disk drive capable of including an embodiment of the present invention, with the disk drive top cover removed to show some internal components.

FIG. 3 is a plan view of a corner region of a disk drive, including a recirculation filter that is capable of including an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a simplified representation of a small region of a recirculation filter mesh according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 is a top perspective view of a disk drive breather filter that is capable of including an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is an exploded top perspective view of a disk drive breather filter that is capable of including an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 7 is a simplified representation of a microscopic region of a three-dimensional metal organic framework nanostructure, after adsorbing contaminate particles.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EXAMPLE EMBODIMENTS

FIG. 1 is a top perspective view of a disk drive 100 that is capable of including an embodiment of the present invention, which has a disk drive enclosure formed by a disk drive base 102 and a disk drive cover 104. The disk drive enclosure may also be completed by gasket, seal, fastener and filter components. The disk drive cover 104 is shown in FIG. 1 to be in place and attached to the disk drive base 102. The disk drive cover 104 may optionally include a hole 106 therethrough, for example to allow limited fluid communication of outside air to a breather filter entrance region 110.

FIG. 2 is a top perspective view of the disk drive 100 of FIG. 1, except with the disk drive top cover 104 removed to show some internal components. Now referring additionally to FIG. 2, the disk drive 100 includes a breather filter 200 adjacent the disk drive base 102. The disk drive 100 also includes various other internal components, such as a voice coil motor 230, rotary actuator 232, at least one head suspension 234, at least one disk 238 mounted on a spindle motor 240, and a recirculation filter 242. Not all internal components of disk drive 100 are shown in FIG. 2, for example a conventional head loading ramp may be positioned adjacent the disk(s) 238 to facilitate merging of the head suspensions 234 onto the disk(s) 238, but is not shown for a more clear view of the breather filter 200.

FIG. 3 is a plan view of a corner region of the disk drive 100 of FIG. 2, which includes the recirculation filter 242. Rotation of the disk(s) 238 induces air flow within the disk drive 100, which flows away from the disk outer periphery at location 310, and then through channel 320 formed in the disk drive base 102. The induced air flow is then directed to flow through the recirculation filter 242, and then through channel 340 back to the disk outer periphery at location 350. In this way, the rotation of the disk(s) 238 causes the air (or alternative gas) within the disk drive enclosure to pass through the recirculation filter 242.

FIG. 4 is a simplified representation of a small region of a recirculation filter mesh 342 according to an embodiment of the present invention. The recirculation filter mesh 342 includes fibers 31 that are impregnated with embedded granules of a first nanoporous adsorbent material 35 and second nanoporous adsorbent material 17. Each of the nanoporous adsorbent materials 35 and 17 is either a metal organic framework (MOF) material or a covalent organic framework (COF) material. The first nanoporous adsorbent material 35 is fluorinated and the second nanoporous adsorbent material 17 is not fluorinated. In this context, a nanoporous adsorbent material is considered to be fluorinated if each of its MOF or COF molecules includes at least one fluorine atom.

FIG. 5 is a top perspective view of a disk drive breather filter 200 that is capable of including an embodiment of the present invention. Now referring to FIG. 5, the breather filter 200 includes a breather filter housing 220 having a top surface 222. A breather filter entrance region 110 protrudes from the top surface 222 of the breather filter housing 220. The breather filter entrance region 110 includes an entrance port 224. The breather filter 200 may be located by its tooling hole 262 and clocking slot 264.

FIG. 6 is an exploded top perspective view of a disk drive breather filter 400 that is capable of including an embodiment of the present invention. The breather filter 400 includes a breather filter housing 420. The breather filter housing 420 includes a labyrinth path 432 that extends from an entrance port 424 to a primary internal container 426. A labyrinth seal layer 428 adheres to the breather filter housing 420 inside the primary internal container 426 to seal the labyrinth path 432 over the entrance port 424 and along the labyrinth path 432 (except for a distal end of the labyrinth path 432 that remains open to the primary internal container 426). In this way, the labyrinth seal layer 428 effectively lengthens the gas diffusion path from the primary internal container 426 through the entrance port 424 to the outside of the breather filter housing 420, to include almost the entire labyrinth path length.

The labyrinth seal layer 428 may comprise an impermeable polymer material, for example. The length of the labyrinth path 432 may be chosen to slow gas flow or diffusion through the entrance port 424 into/from the primary internal container 426, to achieve a desired limited gas flow or limited diffusion rate under expected operating conditions. For example, the labyrinth path may be chosen to be at least 10 times longer than its greatest transverse dimension, to adequately limit the gas diffusion rate in certain embodiments.

In the embodiment of FIG. 6, a first nanoporous adsorbent material 430 may be disposed in the primary internal container 426, with the labyrinth seal layer 428 disposed between the first nanoporous adsorbent material 430 and the labyrinth path 432. Also in the embodiment of FIG. 6, a filter layer 434 may cover the first nanoporous adsorbent material 430, and may be adhered to a periphery of the primary internal container 426 of the breather filter housing 420. The filter layer 434 may comprise a porous polymer material such as a polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) membrane, for example.

The breather filter 400 of the embodiment of FIG. 6 also optionally includes a secondary container 446 in the breather filter housing 420. Optionally, unlike the primary internal cavity 426, there is no gas diffusion path through the secondary container 446 to the outside of the disk drive enclosure (e.g. via the entrance port 424). A second nanoporous adsorbent material 440 may be disposed within the secondary container 446. A secondary filter layer 444 may cover the second nanoporous adsorbent material 440, and the secondary filter layer 444 may comprise the same material as the filter layer 434.

Alternatively, the primary internal container 426 may include granules of both the first and second nanoporous adsorbent materials. In such an alternative embodiment, the secondary container 446 may optionally include a desiccant material. In the embodiment of FIG. 6, the first nanoporous adsorbent material 430 and the second nanoporous adsorbent material 440 are each either a metal organic framework (MOF) material or a covalent organic framework (COF) material. The first nanoporous adsorbent material 430 is fluorinated and the second nanoporous adsorbent material 440 is not fluorinated. In this context, a nanoporous adsorbent material is considered to be fluorinated if each of its MOF or COF molecules includes at least one fluorine atom.

FIG. 7 is a simplified representation of a microscopic region 700 of a three-dimensional MOF nanostructure 710 after adsorbing contaminate particles 720. The MOF nanostructure 710 includes periodically repeating crystal structure 712 that may be three dimensional, each crystal structure 712 including a nanopore 714. The inventive concept is not limited to three-dimensional MOF nanostructures, as the use of two-dimensional MOF nanostructures is also contemplated herein.

In the embodiments of FIGS. 4 and 6, the first and/or second nanoporous adsorbent material may comprise a MOF material that includes a metal (e.g. Zn, Cu, Mn, Cr, Fe, Al, or Ni) or a metalloid such as Si, and an organic linker. In one preferred embodiment, the MOF adsorbent material may comprise a plurality of secondary building units that include octahedral Zn₄O(CO₂)₆ and that are connected by 1,4-benzenedicarboxylate units in a cubic framework.

In certain embodiments, the organic linker in the MOF adsorbent material preferably but does not necessarily comprise azobenzene-3,30,5,50-tetracarboxylate; 5,50-(9,10-anthracenediyl)di-isophthalate; 9,10-anthracenedicarboxylate; azoxybenzene-3,30,5,50-tetracarboxylate; 1,4-benzenedicarboxylate; 1,4-benzenedipyrazolate; biphenyl-3,40,5-tricarboxylate; 4,40-biphenyldicarboxylate; 4,40-trans-bis(4-pyridyl)-ethylene; benzophenone-4,40-dicarboxylate; 3,30,5,50-biphenyltetracarboxylate; 4,40-bipyridine; 1,3,5-tri(4-carboxyphenyl)benzene; benzenetricarboxylate; 1,3,5-benzenetristetrazolate; 1,4-diazabicyclo[2.2.2]octane; 1,2-dihydrocyclobutabenzene-3,6-dicarboxylate; 2,5-dihydroxyterephthalic acid; N,N0-dimethylformamide; fumarate; 4,5,9,10-tetrahydropyrene-2,7-dicarboxylate; 2-methylimidazole; 2,6-naphthalenedicarboxylate; oxydiacetate; pyridine-3,5-bis(phenyl-4-carboxylate); quaterphenyl-3,30 0 0,5,50 0 0-tetracarboxylate; trans-stilbene-3,30,5,50-tetracarboxylic acid; 4,40,40 0-s-triazine-2,4,6-triyltribenzoate; thieno[3,2-b]thiophene-2,5-dicarboxylate; terphenyl-3,30 0,5,50 0-tetracarboxylate; 1,3,5-tri-p-(tetrazol-5-yl)phenylbenzene; 2,4,6-tri-p-(tetrazol-5-yl)phenyl-s-triazine; 1,2,4-triazolate; thieno[3,2-b]thiophene-2,5-dicarboxylate; tetrakis(4-tetrazolylphenyl)methane; or triphenylene-2,6,10-tricarboxylate.

In certain embodiments, the MOF adsorbent material may have a structure that includes one or more porphyrin units, and may comprise one or more functional groups such as —NO₂, —OH, —COOH, —CN, or —SO₃. This may also be true for a COF adsorbent material used in the embodiments of FIGS. 4 and 6. However, the COF adsorbent material also preferably includes an organic covalent linkage (e.g. C—C, C—O, C—N, or Si—C) or a non-organic covalent linkage such as B—O.

The example disk drive adsorbent filters described above may, in certain embodiments, better adsorb the specific contaminates that are expected to be generated within the disk drive enclosure and/or to be important within the disk drive enclosure. For example, CF₃CH₂OH, silane, and C₄H₁₀ may be of particular prevalence or importance in certain disk drive applications because they may be created by lubricant degradation, and be well adsorbed by one or more of the embodiments described herein. Other common disk drive contaminates include particulates and hydrocarbons from various internal and external sources, including but not limited to lubricant degradation.

In the foregoing specification, the invention is described via specific exemplary embodiments, but those skilled in the art will recognize that the invention is not limited to those. It is contemplated that various features and aspects of the invention may be used individually or jointly and possibly in a different environment or application. The specification and drawings are, accordingly, to be regarded as illustrative and exemplary rather than restrictive. For example, the word “preferably,” and the phrase “preferably but not necessarily,” are used synonymously herein to consistently include the meaning of “not necessarily” or optionally. “Comprising,” “including,” and “having,” are intended to be open-ended terms.