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Hardware

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

By carareynolds January 28, 2008, 12:35 AM PST

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Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Seagate ST-250R

Seagate ST-250R

By Drew McBee

Here we have our Seagate ST-250R and old RLL HDD that sports a 50M unformatted and a 42M formatted capacity. I believe you would use an MFM controller for this. I actually used it in a 286 running IBM-DOS back in the day.

I did power it up and it seems to run properly. Nice to know that before I crack it open.

Note: This gallery was originally published on January 28, 2008. It was republished on October 22, 2010 to be featured in our TR Dojo newsletter. — Bill Detwiler

gear2.jpg
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Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Front view

Image: Erin Carson/TechRepublic

Front view

This fits into a 5.25 bay in the PC.

Image: Erin Carson/TechRepublic
Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Warning!

Warning!

This will have to come off…

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Rubber bushings for the mount points

Rubber bushings for the mount points

I found this cool.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Size comparison

Size comparison

As a visual point of reference, I give you an SD card. As another unintentional point of reference, this little SD card holds 10x what our Seagate here holds, and faster.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

The back

The back

The MFM tabs.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Fat foam seal

Fat foam seal

Interesting fat foam seal between the cover and base. Cheap looking, even.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Ground for drive motor

Ground for drive motor

This appears to be the ground for the drive motor — like the brushes in an electric motor. The blue plastic tab in the background was glued to the circuit board on top of it, and held the tab down.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Drive motor and actuator motor

Drive motor and actuator motor

Here we lift the board from the body and get a good look at the bottom of the drive motor, and the actuator motor. There were a total of three connections to the board one for the drive motor, one for the actuator motor, and one for the ribbon that runs the heads, which we’ll see a bit better later.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Circuit board

Funky Geek via Zazzle

Circuit board

The board next to the body.

Funky Geek via Zazzle
Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

The activity LED

The activity LED

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Taking the torx screws out of the cover

Taking the torx screws out of the cover

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

But first I take off the label

But first I take off the label

Don’t ask me why I feel compelled to do it…

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

It's dark in there

It's dark in there

Can’t see much. Disappointing. It did smell like new electronics, though.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Cracking it open, as they say

Cracking it open, as they say

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Cracked

Cracked

I was kind of surprised to see only two platters. Interesting actuator mechanism.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Filter/dessicant

Filter/dessicant

The filter/dessicant looks like a cartridge that they expect to be replaceable.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Actuator mechanism

Actuator mechanism

A good look at the actuator mechanism.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Actuator

Actuator

This, to me, is the most interesting part of the device. The actuator is driven by opposing metal bands. Over in the next three pictures, you can see how it winds and unwinds…

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Actuator

Actuator

Midway through its cycle.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Actuator

Actuator

…And at the end. You can see the torx screw here that must have been used to do some kind of final adjustment during assembly.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Head assembly

Head assembly

A good look at the head assembly.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Actuator extended

Actuator extended

This view shows how the actuator extends in between the two platters when fully extended. (I should have had the platters in focus here…)

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Irma goes for a ride

Irma goes for a ride

Well, I’ve always wanted to power up a big HDD when disassembled, but never got around to it. Here is my big chance. It was going to be hard to demonstrate the platter spinning in a picture, however, so — I give you ‘Irma’, my eight-year-old daughter’s doll. Irma is going for a ride. I glued her feet to the center of the platter for our entertainment.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Irma goes for a ride

Irma goes for a ride

On goes the power, Scottie. She spun for about 6 seconds, when the whole assembly began to shake violently and try to walk off of the bench. Just as I went to hold it down…

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Poor Irma

Poor Irma

The aftermath: after a head-first trip into the wall, Irma is face down in a pile of hardware.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Removing the front cover

Removing the front cover

Okay, on with the project. Here I’m taking off the “front cover.” Notice how the ribbon for the heads was just pinched in between the cover and the seal.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Removing the adjustable stop

Removing the adjustable stop

There seems to be a lot of adjustable parts.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Taking the actuator bands apart

Taking the actuator bands apart

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

I wanted to show how thin these were, but they didn’t show at all in the picture. I guess that says plenty. They were .0015″ each.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Another picture of the bands

Another picture of the bands

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Taking off the actuator

Taking off the actuator

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Mounting screw

Mounting screw

The mounting screw appears to be one piece and pressed into the bearing.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Head closeup

Head closeup

A nice view of the r/w head, This is a fairly hi-res image, if you save and zoom in on it, you can see the little coil at the tip.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Taking the platters apart

Taking the platters apart

The next four pictures show each step of taking the platters apart. The arrows were initially intended to show the rotation when spinning — but then there was Irma….

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Platter 1

Platter 1

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Aluminum spacer

Aluminum spacer

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Platter 2

Platter 2

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Motor

Motor

Here is the motor itself, a Nidec. I’ve seen that brand in another HDD; I’m sure that is a common brand.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Motor bottom

Motor bottom

A good look at the bottom of the motor before removal. Also a good look at the carbon button.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

The motor removed

The motor removed

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Taking out the actuator motor

Taking out the actuator motor

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Plastic seal

Plastic seal

I noticed a thin plastic seal for the drive motor that I didn’t see before.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Motor cover

Motor cover

I had to pry the black cover off, and there was a wavy washer in the bearing cup to keep pressure on the bearing.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Taking the plastic cover off

Taking the plastic cover off

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Actuator motor

Actuator motor

Nice. I’m no electrical engineer, but it looks like there are two sets of controls — a start and stop signal for each direction. If you look closely, you can see where each wire taps into its respective coil.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Another picture of this very cool motor

Another picture of this very cool motor

Maybe someone out there knows exactly what this type of motor is called?

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

And another

And another

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

Taking apart the motor

Taking apart the motor

After the coil came out, it put up a bit of a fight.

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

The coil by itself

The coil by itself

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

The motor, cracked open

The motor, cracked open

Cracking Open a Seagate 50 MB RLL drive

The Seagate 50 MB RLL drive, cracked open

The Seagate 50 MB RLL drive, cracked open

And finally, the whole drive blown up. If you are wondering, yes, it went back together and ran as it did before, though the heads made a bit of noise, and I’m pretty sure that I wouldn’t try to store anything important on it, even if I did have the right controller.

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By carareynolds
Cara Reynolds an editor on TechRepublic's content team. She has been working in educational, licensed, and Web publishing for more years than she cares to admit and hosts the Right Tool for the Job blog on TechRepublic.
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