Patent ID: 11894031
Assignee: HEADWAY TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
Field: Audio-visual technology (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC G | IPC G

Claim 19:
20. The method of claim 17 wherein providing the near field transducer in the TAMR head includes:
(a) forming the waveguide on a bottom cladding layer, and facing the blocker having a front side at the air bearing surface (ABS) and a back side adjoining a first gap layer that separates the blocker and waveguide;
(b) sequentially depositing a first adhesion layer and the resonator body layer portion of the near field transducer (NFT) on the first gap layer and waveguide;
(c) patterning the resonator body layer to form the front side thereof that is recessed the first distance from the ABS;
(d) sequentially forming a second adhesion layer, the peg layer portion of the NFT, and then a hard mask comprising a lower carbon layer and an upper first hard mask layer on the resonator body layer and a surrounding oxide layer;
(e) patterning the first hard mask to form a rectangular shape having a first cross-track width that will define a first cross-track width in a peg portion of the NFT peg layer in a later step;
(f) patterning a second hard mask on the first hard mask, the second hard mask pattern defines a top-down shape that is subsequently etch transferred into the peg layer portion, second adhesion layer, and resonator body layer, the top-down shape has a back side formed parallel to the ABS, and two sides separated by a greater cross-track distance with increasing distance from the ABS;
(g) performing a first reactive ion etch to remove unprotected portions of the carbon hard mask, and then an ion beam etch to remove unprotected portions of the second adhesion layer and resonator body layer, and thereby defining the sides of the peg layer, second adhesion layer, and resonator body layer in a self-aligned process, and removing the remaining portions of the first and second hard masks; and
(h) performing a second reactive ion etch to remove the remaining portion of carbon hard mask.