A new approach to making thin film head-slider devices

A horizontal head processing approach is described in which the air bearing layer and head elements are deposited on a substrate wafer, and then a slider-body wafer is attached to the overcoated head elements by field-assisted bonding. Electrical contacts are made to the head elements through performed vias in the slider-body wafer. The original substrate wafer is etched away to expose the air bearing surface, which then has slider features such as leading edge steps, negative pressure pockets, and rail definitions wet-etched into it. Terminal metallurgy and solder balls are deposited on top of the resulting wafer, which is then diced into individual sliders. Self-loading, mechanical-only sliders (not containing head elements) were made by this approach and successfully flow and start-stop tested. A method for making submicron write-read gaps by direct write electron-beam and reactive ion etching to form a photoresist fence about which Permalloy pole pieces are plated was demonstrated, and a similar method for making gaps filled with hard carbon fences is proposed. A novel magnetoresistive read structure is described