Study on Lubricant Depletion Induced by Laser Heating in Thermally Assisted Magnetic Recording Systems: Effect of Lubricant Thickness

In this study, fundamental research on lubricant depletion due to laser heating in thermally assisted magnetic recording was conducted. In particular, the effect of lubricant film thickness on lubricant depletion was investigated. The conventional lubricant Zdol2000 was used. As a result, it was found that the lubricant depletion characteristics due to laser heating depend largely on the lubricant film thickness. In addition, it was suggested that the lubricant depletion mechanism involves the evaporation of the mobile lubricant molecules, when the maximum attained temperature is not very high. Another suggested lubricant depletion mechanism involves the thermocapillary stress effect induced by the disk surface temperature gradient resulting from the non-uniformity of the laser spot intensity distribution.