Patents Represented by Attorney Intellectual Property Law Offices of Joel Voelzke, APC
  • Patent number: 8320083
    Abstract: An electrical interconnect and a method of making an electrical interconnect in which a conductor has been substantially plated with a first protective metal shell, such as nickel, and a second outer metal shell, such as gold, before a covercoat has been applied. Such an electrical interconnect can be characterized as having an even-thickness outer shell on both its terminal pads and underneath the covercoat adjacent to the terminal pads, without overhangs or gaps near the bottom of the covercoat caused by surface etching during production.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 6, 2007
    Date of Patent: November 27, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventors: Christopher Dunn, Keith A. Vanderlee
  • Patent number: 8313117
    Abstract: A child's riding vehicle such as a tricycle has a secondary steering column through which the parent walking behind the tricycle may steer the tricycle. The secondary steering column is coupled to the first steering column by a pair of rods that are attached at their respective ends to a first flange around the primary steering column and a second flange around the secondary steering column. The steering rods also act as steering limiters by contacting the wheel fork tube at a predetermined maximum steering angle and resisting further rotation of the flange. The mechanism lies entirely within the hollow frame of the tricycle for safety. The child's steering handle can be disengaged from the fork tube to allow the parent to completely control the steering without interference from the child.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 12, 2011
    Date of Patent: November 20, 2012
    Assignee: MGA Entertainment, Inc.
    Inventors: Samir Khare, Yuval Caspi
  • Patent number: 8303792
    Abstract: A method of preparing an additive suspension circuit for a hard disk drive suspension includes electrodepositing an alloy of copper using an electrolytic bath containing copper sulfate, tin, iron, sulfuric acid, and hydrochloric acid, using pulsed current of about 10-45 amperes per square foot.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 29, 2008
    Date of Patent: November 6, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventors: Christopher Schreiber, Peter Hahn, Christopher Dunn
  • Patent number: 8228638
    Abstract: A load beam having a bent rail, a suspension that includes the load beam, and a related method for manufacturing a load beam. The method includes providing the load beam before the bent rail is formed, and coining the load beam at a location where the bend will occur in the rail.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 22, 2010
    Date of Patent: July 24, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventor: Leroy Dwayne Wielenga
  • Patent number: 8223460
    Abstract: A structure for a load beam used in hard disk drive devices includes an asymmetric structure. The load beam exhibits longitudinal asymmetry (i.e., is asymmetric along its long axis) in regard to the weight distribution, but has a center of mass that lies along its longitudinal axis due to the provisioning of counterbalancing features, such as the addition of material, the removal of material, or a combination of adding material and removing material, or the use of an asymmetrical damping layer.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 20, 2009
    Date of Patent: July 17, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventors: Visit Thaveeprungsriporn, Khampon Sittipongpanich, Christopher Schreiber
  • Patent number: 8213126
    Abstract: A support arm for use in a disc drive suspension includes an asymmetry that creates a vertical coupling in the support arm, i.e., a slight lateral movement of the support arm distal end to which a load beam is mounted in response to vibration-induced bending of the support arm. The vertical coupling in the support arm at least partially cancels out during arm bending any vertical coupling which has been designed into the coupling between the load beam and the support arm to reduce track misregistration during flow-induced vibrations of the disc surface. In this way, track misregistration during both flow-induced vibrations and during arm bending is reduced. In a preferred embodiment the asymmetry is created by at least one of a first notch along an inside top edge of the arm, and a second notch along a bottom outside edge of the arm.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 1, 2010
    Date of Patent: July 3, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventor: Shahyar Ziaei
  • Patent number: 8213110
    Abstract: A baseplate that is configured to be included in a hard disk drive suspension assembly, and a related method for manufacturing the baseplate. The baseplate having a surface that has been coined to reduce any roughness that might have existed in a portion of the surface before the surface was coined.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 31, 2007
    Date of Patent: July 3, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventors: Brian Antony Louis Gomes, Shijin Mei
  • Patent number: 8196368
    Abstract: A ductile seismic shear key construction including a concrete support, a concrete shear key supported on the concrete support, a generally vertical reinforcement bar in and extending between the concrete support and the concrete shear key and anchored in the concrete support, and an isolation key. The isolation key is in and at the base of the concrete support and adjacent the reinforcement bar. The bar can be one of the two legs of a downwardly-disposed U-shaped bar. The other leg, if present, is also in and extends between the concrete support and the shear key and is anchored in the concrete support; and a second isolation key is in the concrete support at the base thereof and adjacent the second leg. The bars can pass through through-holes in the isolation keys, particularly for an interior shear key construction. For an exterior shear key construction the bars can be disposed in notches of the isolation key.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 13, 2010
    Date of Patent: June 12, 2012
    Inventor: Majid Sarraf
  • Patent number: 8189301
    Abstract: A microactuator assembly for a hard disk drive head suspension has an expandable base of stainless steel sheet material defining a negative lead affixed to the negative electrode on the bottom surface of a piezoelectric element, and a piece of stainless steel sheet material defining a positive lead attached to the positive electrode on the top surface of the piezoelectric element. The leads may be affixed directly to the piezoelectric element via conductive adhesive. The microactuator assembly can be assembled separately, and then laser welded into place on a suspension. A bond pad made of stainless steel sheet material extends from the flexible circuit, is electrically connected to the microactuator driving voltage conductor within the flexible circuit through a via, and is electrically isolated from the suspension substrate by an insulating film. The microactuator unit positive lead is mechanically and electrically connected to the bond pad via laser welding.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 24, 2009
    Date of Patent: May 29, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventor: Christopher Schreiber
  • Patent number: 8148791
    Abstract: A test assembly for a disk drive suspension head gimbal assembly includes a steel mount plate and a mount sub-plate of a material such as silicon carbide having a modulus of elasticity to density ratio that is significantly higher than the ratio for stainless steel. Preferably the mount plate and the mount sub-plate taken together have a first resonant shear frequency of greater than 50 KHz, which is generally greater than the frequency range of interest for testing head gimbal assemblies. The high modulus of elasticity to density ratio helps to ensure that any shear mode resonances of the test assembly occur at frequencies that are higher than the frequencies of interesting for head gimbal assembly shear resonance testing purposes.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 11, 2009
    Date of Patent: April 3, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventor: Brett Holaway
  • Patent number: 8149545
    Abstract: A dual-stage actuator disk drive suspension load beam has a recessed cavity formed in it into which the microactuator motor is partially or completely placed. The cavity may be formed by partially etching the load beam during the same etching process that creates the load beam from a sheet of stainless steel material. The partially etched load beam having a cavity for the microactuator motor has the advantages of a lower profile, improved inertial balancing of the suspension, and increased sway resonant frequency.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 20, 2009
    Date of Patent: April 3, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventors: Wei Keat Chai, Peter Hahn
  • Patent number: 8125741
    Abstract: A rotational, shear mode, piezoelectric motor is integrated with a suspension, head or head gimbal assembly (HGA) into a collocated, rotational, shear mode, piezoelectric micro-actuated suspension, head or head gimbal assembly (HGA) for use in disk drives and disk drive manufacturing equipment. When excited by a control voltage, the collocated, shear mode, piezoelectric micro-actuated HGA rotates the head enabling high frequency, high resolution track positioning of the read/write element. The motor is integrated with the head and flexure (collocation). The head rotates about a rotation axis that is ideally located at the center of mass of the head. A shear mode piezoelectric motor rotates the head. A collocated, rotational, shear mode, piezoelectric micro-actuated HGA has high stiffness, high frequency response, high positioning resolution, low mass and low internal vibration for improved tracking, increased track density and greater disk drive storage capacity.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 20, 2007
    Date of Patent: February 28, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventor: John R. Shelor
  • Patent number: 8107198
    Abstract: In a disk drive suspension, a gimbal is longitudinally moment-balanced about the dimple to improve shock performance by adding weight to one side of the gimbal and/or by removing weight from the other side of the gimbal, such that when the suspension experiences an operational shock the gimbal the gimbal tends to stay level with the disk surface and not pitch relative to the disk surface. The gimbal may be moment balanced by leaving or depositing on the suspension's limiter tab the same insulative material as is used to form the flexible circuit, by increasing the mass of the limiter tab, and/or by reducing the size of the detabs or the trailing edge, or by other means.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 20, 2009
    Date of Patent: January 31, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventor: Kuen Chee Ee
  • Patent number: 8089731
    Abstract: A disk drive suspension with a bend-down tab which supports an outrigger lead. The bend-down tab extends laterally to the suspension and away from the slider, and can include tabs which are narrower than the electrical lead. The depth of the tab can be at least the depth of the outrigger lead, or deeper. The tab can be supported by and integrally formed with an elongate gimbal spring arm.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 3, 2008
    Date of Patent: January 3, 2012
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventors: Li Jun Ma, Fei He
  • Patent number: 8085506
    Abstract: A gimbal, a disk drive suspension that includes the gimbal, and a related method of manufacture, wherein the gimbal is configured to be coupled between a disk drive slider and a disk drive load beam. The gimbal includes a strut having a buss and a projection that is coupled to the buss. A combination of the projection and the buss define a gap.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 27, 2007
    Date of Patent: December 27, 2011
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventors: Kuen Chee Ee, Christopher Gene Dunn, Keith Allan Vanderlee, Peter Sung Hahn
  • Patent number: 8049995
    Abstract: A method of designing a hard disk drive suspension swage hub geometry for an actuator arm having upper and lower suspensions attached thereto, includes using a finite element analysis model to simulate the effects of swaging the suspensions to the actuator arm, identifying relevant geometric parameters of the suspensions, for each suspensions performing a linear regression to fit an equation containing the geometric parameters to a normal force of the suspension to the actuator arm after swaging according to the fine element analysis, identifying a desired range of differences between the normal forces, using the desired difference range, and solving for values of geometric parameters to produce a set of target design parameters for the suspension swage hubs.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 26, 2008
    Date of Patent: November 1, 2011
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventors: Kuen Chee Ee, Peter Hahn
  • Patent number: 8004798
    Abstract: A disk drive flexure has a pattern of voids in the ground plane in the area directly underneath the read and write bond pads, in order to adjust the respective impedances of the read and write bond pad pairs to match the impedances of the read and write transducers and the signal trace pairs to and from the transducers. The resulting impedance matched bond pads increase the effective signal bandwidth of the flexure and its electrical connections, decreasing the probability of error at high signal speeds and increasing the maximum data rate through the suspension.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 4, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 23, 2011
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventor: Christopher Gene Dunn
  • Patent number: 7957100
    Abstract: A disk drive gimbal, an apparatus, and a related method of manufacture, wherein the disk drive gimbal includes a strut having a trace with a zig-zag shape. The trace is made from conducting material, and the zig-zag shape is configured to provide a level of stress relief to the conducting material that is included in the trace.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 29, 2007
    Date of Patent: June 7, 2011
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventor: Christopher Mark Schreiber
  • Patent number: 7940490
    Abstract: An apparatus and a method for improving bandwidth of a fine positioning mechanism in data storage manufacturing and test equipment that require fine positioning of a head on or about a track. The method comprises the steps of sensing separate sources of mechanical disturbance that mis-position the head with one or more non-contact position sensors, generating a compensating position control signal from one or more input signals, and positioning the head with a fine positioning mechanism and position control signal. The apparatus uses a shear mode micro-actuator as a fine positioning mechanism.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 26, 2008
    Date of Patent: May 10, 2011
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventor: John R. Shelor
  • Patent number: 7907367
    Abstract: A punched gimbal dimple with an annular coined periphery extending outward from the dimple in a head suspension and a method for producing such a dimple. The dimple and its coined periphery are fabricated from a dimple punch and a die with a raised coining surface. The coined area on the dimple periphery can be seen by optical systems as a shiny ring, which is useful for aligning a slider to the dimple. The coined periphery is also less distorted by dimple punching than a non-coined periphery.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 19, 2007
    Date of Patent: March 15, 2011
    Assignee: Magnecomp Corporation
    Inventors: David Chocholaty, Leroy Wielenga, Chu Wong