Stiction due to the in-plane component of surface tension
Introduction: When a slider rests on a magnetic recording disk. the iii-plane force requlred to inmate sliding often exceeds the normal load force, sometimes by more than an order of magnitude This phenomenon is called stiction. It is due to lubricant menisci in the slider-disk interface. However tlic role of menisci is often misunderstood. It is widely believed that the meniscus pressure exerts a normnl force between the slider and the disk. The normal force, when multiplied by the coniuci coefficient of friction, contributes to the in-plane stiction force [I]. In order to explain the enormous stiction, the contact coefficient of friction (pj and the normal force due to meniscus pressure must be both very large. Even if p=O.2, which is already unrealistically high for a iuhricoicd interface, the meniscus pressure is still too small to supply the required normal force This difficulty is overcome by a new model described in this paper.