| Vibro-acoustic characteristics of compact electro-mechanical devices are not well understood. This study examines fundamental research issues in this area through the example case of a 3.5" personal computer hard disk drive. In particular, a narrow band mathematical model of the drive has been developed to predict prominent pure tones over the high frequency range (1-6.5 KHz). Through detailed analytical studies, it has been found that the motor torque pulsation of the brushless d.c. motor is the source for this noise problem. Accordingly, a simplified disk drive model consisting of motor driving a single disk is used to investigate key components, with emphasis on the development of new mathematical models to describe the source, path and radiator characteristics.; Two different mathematical models have been developed for brushless d.c. motor to predict the torque spectrum associated with invertor switching logic, pulse width modulation control scheme, eccentricity, and magnetic saturation. Frequency contents of predicted variables are identified and matched with measured sound data. Additionally, the Galerkin's method (or modified harmonic balance) is also employed successfully to develop an efficient computational scheme which predicts the Fourier coefficients of torque pulsations directly including various effects associated with inductance harmonics and the fluctuation of rotor angular velocity. For the radiator (annular disk), modal base formulations of sound radiation have been developed by approximating disk eigen-functions. Specifically, the effects of modal coupling and source rotation on radiated sound are investigated. Analytical predictions match well with numerical results obtained by using a boundary element program. New mobility transfer functions (path) are derived to couple the source and radiator formulations in order to construct an overall vibro-acoustic model. Potential areas of further research including experimental validation are discussed. |
