Swaging appartus with a tubular boss having axially extending surface irregularities and swaging technique for thin actuator arm assemblies

A rigid disk data storage transducer head-gimbal assembly comprising

• an actuator arm with a generally circular opening extending therethrough;
• a swage plate with a tubular boss portion which extends into said actuator arm generally circular opening;
• and
• a transducer supporting load beam secured to said arm by said swage plate,
• said swage plate tubular boss portion having an axisymmetric outside diameter surface adjoining a bottom surface of said swage plate, an axisymmetric inside diameter surface defining a bore hole through said swage plate, and an axisymmetric distal end surface adjoining said outside diameter surface and said inside diameter surface, wherein some portion of said inside diameter surface lies within said bore hole between a plane defined by a top surface of said swage plate and a plane defined by said bottom surface of said swage plate, wherein said outside diameter surface is a single frusto conical surface having a largest diameter end adjoining said bottom surface of said swage plate, and wherein an upsetting of the material of said tubular boss by an expansion tool changes said outside diameter surface of said tubular boss to become substantially parallel to the axial direction of said tubular boss to produce an interference fit with the adjacent actuator arm wall surface that forms said generally circular opening such that said upsetting also changes said distal end surface of said tubular boss to become substantially perpendicular to the axial direction.

A rigid disk data storage device comprising

• a base member;
• a disk assembly including a plurality of disks mounted for rotation in unison and mounted on said base member;
• an actuator mounted on said base member including a plurality of arms with mounting holes adjacent the distal ends and driven by a voice coil motor;
• a plurality of load beam-transducer assemblies;
• and
• a micro-swage connector carried by each of said load beam-transducer assemblies and received in respective actuator arm mounting holes, each said micro-swage connector including a tubular boss, wherein said tubular boss having
• an axisymmetric outside diameter surface adjoining a bottom surface of a swage plate;
• an axisymmetric inside diameter surface defining a bore hole through said swage plate;
• an axisymmetric distal end surface adjoining said outside diameter surface and said inside diameter surface, wherein some portion of said inside diameter surface lies within said bore hole between a plane defined by a top surface of said swage plate and a plane defined by said bottom surface of said swage plate, wherein said outside diameter surface is a single frusto conical surface having a largest diameter end adjoining said bottom surface of said swage plate, and wherein an upsetting of the material of said tubular boss by an expansion tool changes said outside diameter surface of said tubular boss to become substantially parallel to the axial direction of said tubular boss to produce an interference fit with the adjacent actuator arm wall surface that forms said generally circular opening such that said upsetting also changes said distal end surface of said tubular boss to become substantially perpendicular to the axial direction.