High Selectivity Etching for Texture Fabrication on Air Bearing Surface

Reactive ion etching processes for texture fabrication on air bearing surface is investigated to improve the etching selectivity between Al2O3 and TiC. Etching parameters, such as gas flow rate, pressure, ICP power, and RF power, are optimized. The high selectivity etching between Al2O3 and TiC is achievable by the ICP reactive ion etching with CF4. The selectivity between Al2O3 and TiC can be larger than 6, it means that the Al2O3 is only etched 1 nm to fabricate texture with more than 5-nm height. The experimental results show that the textured sliders fabricated with the developed process can prevent sharp increase of friction force and reduce contact vibration