Friday 7 October 2011

Hard Drive Magnets

Hard Drive Magnets

Hard Drive Magnets - Strong and Fun

Hard drive magnets can be heaps of fun. I take them out of my old hard drives and distribute them to my brothers. They can be useful for holding things together and are fun to fiddle with. They can be used to fix the book that was open on its spine and are great for competitions in seeing who can pull the magnets apart (this is extremely hard). The magnets are powerful enough to go through someone's hand and maybe even two hands.

How to get the magnets out of the hard drive

The first step in getting some hard drive magnets is finding a hard drive that you no longer need or is broken in some way. Remember once you open it, the hard drive will no longer be usable. Firstly find all the screws and take them out. Some hard drives will have different screws meaning that you may have to drill through the screw or lever it using a flat screw driver. hard drive magnet labelledOnce you take all the screws out you will need to lever up the metal lid till it comes off. After this you will need to locate the actuator where the magnets are located.
The actuator motor may have some screws holding it together. Undo these and then you should be able to lift the top half off. On the metal there may be a magnet. If not, don't worry there should will be one underneath the actuator arm.






hard drive magnet openedTo get the second magnet out you will probably need to crack the end of the actuator arm and unscrew any last screws holding the magnet in. After this you should have both magnets out of the hard drive. If you 
prefer to have the magnet by itself you can break the magnet from the metal. However this makes the magnet a lot more fragile 
so I would recommend leaving it on the metal.

 

 

One last challenge

Connect both of the magnets together and now try without turning them to pull them apart only using your hands. This is very difficult and congratulations if you can do it. If you can't take both magnets off, simply twist the magnets in the opposite direction. As soon as they are not facing each other they will be much easier to break apart. 

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