Thomas & Betts Corporation

Thomas & Betts International LLC

Eric D Juntwait

Wayne T Wellinsky

Scott J Lapraik

Jeffrey C Howland

Charles Ray Murphy

An electrical connector which includes electrical connector contacts and flexible wires extending from the contacts is formed. The connector is formed having an internal skeletal mold insert which includes means for supporting and aligning the electrical contacts and means for anchoring the wires to the skeletal mold insert. The wires are electrically connected to the contacts and mechanically affixed to the wire anchor means such that wire stability and alignment is insured during an overmolding process. The skeletal mold insert, contacts and wire form a subassembly which is overmolded with a substantially insulative material to form the finished connector.

Overmolded connector and method for manufacturing same

An electrical connector comprises an elongate insulative housing having a plurality of cavities extending in side-by-side relation along the longitudinal housing direction. Each of the cavities is nominally spaced for fine pitch applications to be on the order of 0.050 inch. A wire contact assembly which is snapped into the connector housing and resiliently held therein by a releasable latch, comprises an insulation crimping portion that is formed during the crimping process to be of oval configuration. The oval configuration allows the use of wires at least as large as 28 AWG in such fine pitch spacings and permits installation of each wire contact assembly into the connector in the same orientation.

Fine pitch discrete wire cable connector

A high density electrical connector is provided for supporting a plurality of contact assemblies in a geometric array, each contact assembly comprising a conductive contact portion, a retention portion, a vertical offset portion and a conductive connection portion. The contact portions are disposed in side by side positions along n rows across the connector. An insulative housing is provided having a rear wall, a forward wall and a plurality of contact assembly support cavities extending between the rear and forward walls. Each support cavity has a contact retention rib which engages the retention portion of the contact assembly. Each support cavity also has an elongate contact entry opening in the rear wall, the entry openings being disposed along n pairs of rows in a staggered array, with adjacent cavities in each pair of rows being alternately upright and inverted. The entry openings for upright cavities in a pair of rows lie along a first center line. The entry openings for inverted cavities lie along a second center line offset from the first center line by a distance less than height of the contact entry openings such that the inverted and upright cavities in each pair of rows are interleaved.

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Irvine, CA, United States of America

Eric D Juntwait