Visco-elastically damped magnetic head suspension assembly

Claim 1

A head support arm for a disk file adapted to support a transducing head at one end closely adjacent to a planar recording disk and adapted at the other end to be mounted on a positioning apparatus in cantilever fashion, the arm comprising a relatively rigid structure, the improvement comprising: a resilient magnetic head suspension assembly fixed at one end to said head support arm having means on the other end to support a transducing head and comprising an elongated flat load beam connecting said one and said other end, said load beam compressing two major surface areas extending in a plane substantially parallel to said head support arm; a layer of damping material fixed to substantially cover one of said major surface areas of said load beam; and a relatively thin constraining member fixed in contact with substantially the entire area of said layer of damping material but substantially mechanically isolated from said load beam so that the amplitude of vibrations in said head suspension assembly is significantly reduced due to shear energy absorption damping in said layer of damping material whereby, when said transducing head is positioned closely adjacent to a moving planar recording disk, the spacing between said transducing head and said planar recording disk is maintained at a predetermined spacing.