US Patent 10460750 Plating based pre-defined side shield and application in magnetic head

A magnetic recording head having an air bearing surface (ABS) includes a main pole, a side shield laterally spaced from the main pole by a first side gap and a second side gap, an electrically conductive non-magnetic gap material layer disposed between the main pole and the side shield in the first side gap, and a dielectric non-magnetic gap material matrix and a conformal dielectric spacer layer disposed between the main pole and the side shield in the second side gap. The dual side gap recording head can improve on track performance on write gap peak field, on track performance on write field gradient, ATI off track performance, WATER reliability and can provide advantageous writer and side shield saturation properties.