Patent ID: 7312941

Claim:
A disk drive, comprising: a base casting; at least one disk surface coupled to the base casting; an actuator assembly for accurately positioning at least one slider over the disk surface; a suspension load beam having a dimple, wherein the load beam is coupled to the actuator assembly; and a laminated flexure coupled to the suspension load beam, the flexure having a surface adapted to receive a slider and a surface adapted to contact the dimple, the flexure including a head-disk interaction sensor integral with said flexure for outputting a sensor signal when the slider contacts a disk of the disk drive wherein the head-disk interaction sensor is a pressure sensor sensing a pressure between the flexure and the dimple generated by the slider contacting the disk of the disk drive and wherein the pressure sensor includes a piezoelectric material layer and a conductive material layer, the piezoelectric material layer and the conductive material layer each being formed as a layer of the laminated flexure and each being patterned to substantially correspond to a surface region of the flexure corresponding to the dimple.