Voltage assisted asymmetric nanoscale wear on ultra-smooth diamond like carbon thin films at high sliding speeds

TL;DR

This study investigates how voltage-assisted electrochemical effects influence nanoscale wear on ultra-smooth diamond-like carbon films at high sliding speeds, revealing asymmetric wear patterns in a hard disk drive interface.

Contribution

It introduces the use of a commercial hard disk drive head-disk interface as a model system to study electrochemical wear at high speeds.

Findings

Voltage-assisted electrochemical wear causes asymmetric wear.

High sliding speeds influence surface chemical reactions.

The head-disk interface is effective for nanoscale wear studies.

Abstract

The understanding of tribo- and electro-chemical phenomenons on the molecular level at a sliding interface is a field of growing interest. Fundamental chemical and physical insights of sliding surfaces are crucial for understanding wear at an interface, particularly for nano or micro scale devices operating at high sliding speeds. A complete investigation of the electrochemical effects on high sliding speed interfaces requires a precise monitoring of both the associated wear and surface chemical reactions at the interface. Here, we demonstrate that head-disk interface inside a commercial magnetic storage hard disk drive provides a unique system for such studies. The results obtained shows that the voltage assisted electrochemical wear lead to asymmetric wear on either side of sliding interface.