Wafer fabrication for thermal pole tip expansion/recession compensation

The present invention relates to the field of mass storage devices. More particularly, this invention relates to a disc drive that includes a slider, which is designed to maintain the fly height of the slider even though portions of the slider thermally expand during operation of the disc drive. The slider and method of the present invention relate to a slider for a disc drive. The slider includes a substrate having a cavity and a filler within the cavity. The slider further includes a transducer that is positioned near the filler. The design facilitates controlling the relative thermal expansion between the transducer and substrate of the slider that is near the transducer. Compensating for the thermal expansion of the transducer provides a more consistent fly height of the slider during operation of the disc drive. In addition, the design adjusts the air-bearing surface of the slider such that the transducer does not extend below the rest of the slider as the transducer expands.