JPH02220281A - Cleaner for information recording medium - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To sweep dust without taking out an information recording medium from a cartridge and flawing it in the peripheral direction by moving a cleaning member in the radial direction of the information recording medium and rotating this member in the peripheral direction of the disk to clean the recording face of the information recording medium. CONSTITUTION:A disk D is stored in a cartridge 1, and the cartridge 1 is provided with a rectangular aperture part 2 where a spindle hole Da and a part of a recording part Db of the disk D are exposed. In a cleaning mechanics 4 inserted to the aperture part 2, a columnar cleaning member 5 made of a soft elastic member is freely rotatably attached to a holder 7 through a shaft 6. Since this cleaning member 5 is held freely rotatably around the shaft 6. the members 5 is rotated around the shaft 6 though being stopped on the recording part Db of the disk D, and flaws in the peripheral direction are prevented without causing friction in the peripheral direction of the disk. Further, the cleaning face is always changed and is efficiently used because the member 5 is rotated little by little at each time of stop.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to an information recording medium cleaner used for, for example, a disc-shaped recording medium housed in a disc cartridge.

[Prior Art] In recent years, as a recording medium for recording, reproducing, and erasing information using a light beam, a disk-shaped substrate made of glass, synthetic resin, etc., and a substrate with a thickness of 100 to 500 mm provided on this substrate have been used.
Magneto-optical disks formed by perpendicularly magnetized films on the human scale are attracting attention. This perpendicularly magnetized film is made of ms such as an amorphous alloy, and has a characteristic of being magnetized in the direction perpendicular to the film surface. When recording information on a magneto-optical disk, first a perpendicular magnetic field is applied to the magneto-optical disk to align the magnetization direction of the perpendicularly magnetized film in one direction.
Next, when the perpendicularly magnetized film is irradiated with a laser beam spot digitally modulated according to the information signal, the temperature of the irradiated area rises above the Curie point, and the magnetization is caused by the influence of the surrounding magnetic field acting at this time. The direction is reversed and a recorded bit of logic "1" or rOJ is formed.

When reproducing information, first a linearly polarized laser beam is made incident on the recording bit. At this time, the plane of polarization of one reflected light rotates slightly due to the magneto-optic effect, or Kerr effect, corresponding to the magnetization direction of the recording bit, so this rotation is detected as a change in the light amount via an analyzer, and the information is reproduced. will be held.

In this way, magneto-optical disks use laser light to record, read, and erase information in a non-contact manner through a transparent substrate that protects a perpendicularly magnetized film, so they are generally less susceptible to dust than magnetic disks. It is said that there are few. However, in reality, it is impossible to ignore the influence of dust, and various types of disc cleaners are available for the generally popular CD discs.

FIG. 8 shows a cleaner for information recording media when only a disc, such as a CD disc, is loaded into a disc drive device. If the disc D is scratched to a certain length or more in the circumferential direction, it becomes impossible to reproduce the recorded signal. Therefore, the disc-shaped disc D has a recording portion with a radius D1 in the radial direction. An annular cleaning member C having a diameter larger than 41i101 is rotated on this recording portion, and the cleaning member C is configured to slide on the surface of the disk D in an arc shape in a substantially radial direction to clean the surface of the disk D. Also, even when disc D is stored in a cartridge, the cartridge is not completely sealed, and when it is installed in a drive device and information is being recorded or played back, the shutter of the cartridge is open. Furthermore, since dust and the like flow in together with the air that is sent in to air-cool the inside of the drive device, there is a risk that this dust will adhere to the disk. Therefore, some disk drive devices may have a built-in brush for disk cleaning.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] However, the cleaning direction of the brush built into the disk drive device is the circumferential direction, and there is a risk that cleaning may cause harmful scratches. It also has the disadvantage of not being able to deal with oil stains such as fingerprints. Furthermore, when the disk is housed in a cartridge, only the opening for insertion of the record ◆ playback head that the cartridge has is exposed to the disk, and an annular cleaning member C as shown in the conventional example is used. That is impossible.

An object of the present invention is to remove dust by wiping the recording surface of a disc housed in a cartridge while moving the cleaning member back and forth in the radial direction of the disc, thereby preventing a decrease in the amount of laser light and improving the signal-to-noise ratio. An object of the present invention is to provide a cleaner for an information recording medium that can reduce errors during recording Φ reproduction by improving .

[Means for Solving the Problems] In order to achieve the above object, the information recording medium cleaner according to the present invention cleans the surface of the information recording medium on which information is recorded and reproduced by rotation. In the cleaner, a holder that rotatably holds a substantially cylindrical cleaning member is reciprocated in the radial direction of the information recording medium, and the cleaning member is rotated about an axis facing in the radial direction of the information recording medium. It is characterized by this.

[Function] In the information recording medium cleaner having the above configuration, the cleaning member moves in the radial direction on the information recording medium to wipe the disk recording surface, and also rotates in the circumferential direction in accordance with the rotation of the information recording medium. .

[Example] The present invention will be explained in detail based on the example illustrated in FIGS. 1 to 7.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a first embodiment of the present invention. A thin box-shaped cartridge 1 houses a disk-shaped disk D therein, and is provided with a substantially rectangular opening 2 that exposes a spindle hole Da of the disk D and a part of a recording section Db. ing. Note that a shutter 3 is attached to the opening 2 so as to be openable and closable. On the other hand, the cleaning mechanism 4 inserted into the opening 2 is constructed by rotatably attaching a cylindrical cleaning member 5 formed of a soft elastic member to a holder 7 via a shaft 6. The holder 7 is arranged in a drive storage body (not shown) so as to coincide with the radial direction of D and to allow the holder 7 to reciprocate in the radial direction.

In such a configuration, first, the shutter 3 is opened by an opening mechanism (not shown), and the opening 2 is held in an open state.Next, the shaft 6 of the cleaning mechanism 4 is opened from the opening 2.
is inserted while maintaining parallel to the radial direction of the disk D, contacts the recording portion I)b of the disk D, pushes the disk D to such an extent that the soft cleaning member 5 is distorted, and then stops F.

FIG. 2 shows the state of contact between the cleaning mechanism 4 and the disk D at this time, with (a) being a side view and (b) being a front view. In this state, the cleaning mechanism 4 is reciprocated in the direction of arrow A by a crank mechanism (not shown), and the disk D is rotated in the direction of arrow B to perform cleaning.
The cleaning ends when the disk D rotates several times. Here, while the disk D is constantly rotating, the cleaning mechanism 4 is reciprocating in accordance with the rotational movement of the crank, and always stops temporarily when the forward and backward paths are reversed.

If the cleaning member 5 were fixed to the holder 7 in a non-rotatable manner, the cleaning member 5 would slide in the circumferential direction over the disc mouth when the cleaning mechanism 4 is stopped F, and the recording part ob of the disc D would be There is a risk of causing harmful damage. Therefore, it may be possible to stop the cleaning mechanism 4 at a location other than the recording section [1b] above the disk mouth, but since the inner circumferential side of the recording section Db is used for the mechanism that clamps and rotates the disk D, it is wide. It is impossible to take up space. Similarly, since the outer circumferential side of the recording section ob is also determined by the clearance with the inner wall of the cartridge 1, the forward and return passes are reversed at the inner circumferential side and the outer circumferential side of the recording section Db, where a large space cannot be taken. In order to achieve this, the cleaning member 5 must be made smaller, which reduces the cleaning efficiency and requires frequent replacement of the cleaning member 5. Furthermore, since the outer circumference of the recording section Db is close to the outer diameter of the disk D, the cleaning member 5 moves around the disk D in the process of cleaning by stopping the cleaning mechanism 4 at the non-recording part of the outer circumference of the recording section ob and reversing the direction. There is also a risk that it may fall outside.

However, since the cleaning member 5 according to this embodiment is rotatably held around the shaft 6, even if the cleaning member 5 stops at the recording area Db of the disk D, it rotates around the shaft 6. There is no friction in the circumferential direction, and scratches occurring in the circumferential direction are prevented. Furthermore.

Since the cleaning member 5 rotates little by little each time it stops, the cleaning surface constantly changes and can be used efficiently.

FIG. 3 shows a second embodiment. In this second embodiment, the cleaning member 8 has a conical shape, and the structure and operation of the cleaning mechanism 4 are substantially the same as those in the first embodiment. FIG. 4(a) is a side view of the cleaning mechanism 4, and FIG. 4(b) is a side view of the cleaning mechanism 4.
) shows a front view, and the cleaning member 8 has a larger diameter on the outer peripheral side of the disk D. Since the disk D travels a different distance per unit time between the inner and outer circumferences, there is a risk that the cylindrical cleaning member 5 may be twisted due to the difference in angular velocity between the inner and outer circumferences. Therefore, by changing the diameter of the cleaning member 8 according to the angular velocity of the disk D, the entire surface of the cleaning member 8 rotates in synchronization with the rotation of the disk D.

ptS5 figure shows a third embodiment, in which the cleaning mechanism 4
In this embodiment, two cylindrical cleaning members 9a and 9b having a smaller diameter than in the first embodiment are arranged in parallel.

They are each rotatably attached to the holder 7.

In this third embodiment, as shown in the side view of FIG. 6(a) and the front view of FIG. 6(b), the cleaning area can be widened, so there is no unwiped area by just rotating the disk D once. , the entire surface can be cleaned.

Furthermore, since the diameters of the cleaning members 9a and 9b are reduced, the height of the entire cleaning mechanism 4 can be reduced.

Even if only one cleaning member 5.8 is used, the rotational speed of the disk D may be slowed down relative to the reciprocating speed of the cleaning mechanism 4, or cleaning residues may be removed during the first rotation of the disk D. By adjusting the phase of the reciprocating movement of the cleaning mechanism 4 so that the removed portion is wiped off in the second rotation, it is possible to eliminate any unwiped portions.

FIG. 7 shows a fourth embodiment of a mechanism for attaching and detaching the cleaning member 5 from the holder 7, in which a shaft 6 to which the cleaning member 5 is attached is rotatably fitted into a groove lO provided in the holder 7. The shaft 6 is elastically held inside the groove 1o by the leaf spring 11. With this configuration, even when the cleaning member 5 becomes dirty, it can be easily replaced.

Furthermore, although the cleaning members 5.8.9a and 9b described above may be of a dry type, the cleaning effect can be further improved by impregnating them with a cleaning liquid.

[Effects of the Invention] As explained above, the information recording medium cleaner according to the present invention moves the cleaning member in the radial direction of the information recording medium and cleans the recording surface of the information recording medium while rotating in the circumferential direction of the disk. Therefore, it becomes possible to wipe off dust and the like without removing the information recording medium from the cartridge and without causing circumferential scratches that are harmful to recording and reproducing information.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Drawings 1 to 7 show an embodiment of the information recording medium cleaner according to the present invention, and FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of the first embodiment;
FIG. 2(a) is a side view of the cleaning mechanism of the first embodiment, FIG. 3(b) is a front view, and FIG. 3 is a configuration diagram of the second embodiment.
FIG. 4(a) is a side view of the cleaning mechanism of the second embodiment, FIG. 4(b) is a front view, and FIG. 5 is a configuration diagram of the third embodiment.
FIG. 6(a) is a side view of the cleaning mechanism of the third embodiment, FIG. 7(b) is a front view, FIG. 7(a) is a side view of the cleaning mechanism of the fourth embodiment, and FIG. 7(b) is a front view. It is a diagram. FIG. 8 is an explanatory diagram of a conventional disk cleaner. Symbol l is a disk cartridge, 2 is an opening, 3 is a shutter, 4 is a cleaning mechanism, 5, 8.9a, 9b are cleaning members, 6 is a shaft, 7 is a holder, 10 is a groove, 1
1 is a leaf spring, and D is a disk. ! [32 114 fig.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In an information recording medium cleaner that cleans the surface of an information recording medium that records and reproduces information by rotation, a holder that rotatably holds a substantially cylindrical cleaning member is reciprocated in the radial direction of the information recording medium. The information recording medium cleaner is characterized in that the cleaning member rotates around an axis facing in the radial direction of the information recording medium.