Patent ID: 8365393

Claim:
A method comprising: plating at least one side shield and a pole tip layer on a plating seed layer, each of the at least one side shield and the pole tip layer separated by a trench; depositing a first non-magnetic material in the trench using ion-beam assisted deposition wherein the ion-beam assisted deposition is an angled-incident ion-beam assisted deposition; wherein the angled-incident ion-beam assisted deposition forms a thin surface layer; further comprising an electro-plating step to fill the trench between the at least one side shield and the pole tip with a second non-magnetic material; further comprising a normal-incident ion milling step to expose the plating seed layer on the bottom of the trench between the at least one side shield and the pole tip; and wherein the step of normal-incident ion milling occurs subsequent to the step of angled-incident ion-beam assisted deposition and prior to the step of electro-plating.