Optimizing tape‐burnishing/wiping process of magnetic recording media through Taguchi method

For the ever‐increasing recording density in hard disk drives, ultra‐low gliding height media are required. It is an immense challenge for the tape‐burnishing/wiping process of media to reduce the asperities effectively and efficiently while no scratches occur. The purpose of this paper is to characterize and then optimize the tape‐burnishing/wiping process as so to minimize the asperities without leaving any scratches on the media surface. A Taguchi experiment design method is adopted to analyze the data and acquire an optimal level combination of process parameters. The resulting optimal combination is practically implemented in tape‐burnishing/wiping the several magnetic recording media, which reveals that the average pass ratio of 5 nm glide avalanche testing increases nearly doubly to a level of 96%. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.