Process for producing a thin film head of the floating type

A process for producing floating thin film heads each comprising a) a head slider having a slider surface to be opposed to the signal face of a recording medium with a small space formed therebetween, b) one or a plurality of head elements formed by thin film forming techniques on a face of the head slider orthogonal to said slider surface, and c) a protective layer formed over said face of the head slider and covering the head element or elements, the process comprising the step of:

• a head forming step comprising forming a multiplicity of thin film head elements on a substrate to be made into head sliders;
• a protective layer forming step comprising a step of providing a mask at a position above the substrate surface on which the multiplicity of thin film head elements are formed, the mask having an opening for each of the thin film heads to be fabricated said opening to expose one or a plurality of head elements for each thin film head, and a step of forming an insulating material for forming a protective layer as a film on the substrate surface by sputter deposition through the mask provided thereover, wherein the mask providing step comprises a first step of forming a resist layer over the multiplicity of head elements, a second step of forming a lift-off layer over the resist layer, and a third step of etching the lift-off layer to shape the lift-off layer into the mask and undercutting the resist remaining beneath the mask;
• and
• a chip forming step comprising removing the mask along with the resist and dividing the substrate into a plurality of thin film heads each having said one or plurality of head elements.