Patent ID: 7634850

Claim:
A method of manufacturing a magnetic head slider, comprising the steps of: forming, a read head and a process detection pattern for read, and a write head and a process detection pattern for write, on a wafer; cutting the wafer into row bars each including a plurality of head elements contiguous to each other; pressing the row bar against a rotating lapping surface table, swinging the row bar in a radial direction of the lapping surface table and lapping an air bearing surface while monitoring the process detection patterns for read and write, in which if the air-bearing surface is lapped with the row bar tilted in the longitudinal direction of a slider to compensate element height-wise positional deviations of the read head and the write head, the lapping is performed while changing an inclination angle stepwise and swinging the row bar in the longitudinal direction of the slider centering around an inclination angle at each step; forming a protection film on the air-bearing surface after lapping the row bar; and cutting the row bar into separated individual magnetic head sliders, wherein in the step of lapping the air-bearing surface of the row bar, when the row bar is lapped while being swung in the longitudinal direction of the slider, a head element forming portion side and a leading end side of the row bar are lapped alternately.