Molex Corporation

Methode Electronics, Incorporated

Irvin R Triner

Harold Keith Lang

Augusto P Panella

Philip J Dambach

Alan S Walse

David C Bowen

Joseph W Nelligan, Jr

Shyh-Lin Tung

Craig A Bixler

Frank A Harwath

Jerry A Long

Emanuel G Banakis

Donald J Brinkman

Henry Zielke

Gregory D Spanier

Charles S Galauner

Martin Uche Ogbuokiri

John M Yun

Kai Mook Cheong

Dennis R Cakora

Steve Anil Shah

John N Martinowich

Joseph W Bird

A card edge connector for mounting on a circuit board and removeably receiving a circuit card includes an elongated housing defining a card receiving slot. Numerous terminal receiving cavities intersect and extend to both sides of the slot. Alternate cavities include stamped references (ground or power) terminals and signal terminals, all having downwardly extending board contacts and upwardly extending spring arms. There are numerous similar sets of face to face contacts, each including a reference contact parallel to and substantially overlying an opposed pair of signal contacts. The upwardly extending reference terminal spring arms include oversize pad portions for reducing crosstalk by increasing coupling between the reference and signal terminals. The circuit paths to the circuit board are in an array symmetrical about the centerline of the circuit card, with parallel inner lines of circuits containing only reference contacts and outer lines of circuits containing only signal contacts.

Card edge connector with symmetrical board contacts

An improved flexible circuit connector that is particularly useful in connections for circuit boards has a housing and a circuit card engaging assembly mounted therein. The circuit card engaging assembly includes at least two contact spring members having a U-shaped portion adjoining a body portion thereof such that when the two contact spring members are brought together at their body portions, a U-shaped channel is formed that supports two lengths of flexible circuity close to the surface and edge of a circuit board inserted into the connector channel.

Flexible circuit connector for circuit board applications

A card edge connector for mounting on a circuit board and removeably receiving a circuit card includes an elongated housing defining a card receiving slot. Numerous terminal receiving cavities intersect and extend to both sides of the slot. Alternate cavities include stamped reference (ground or power) terminals and signal terminals, all having downwardly extending board contacts and upwardly extending spring arms. There are numerous similar sets of face to face contacts, each including a reference contact parallel to and substantially overlying an opposed pair of signal contacts. The upwardly extending reference terminal spring arms include oversize pad portions for reducing crosstalk by increasing coupling between the reference and signal terminals. The circuit paths to the circuit board are in an array symmetrical about the centerline of the circuit card, with parallel inner lines of circuits containing only reference contacts and outer lines of circuits containing only signal contacts.

Card edge connector with improved reference terminals

Provided is an electrical connector for connecting a first electrical component to a circuit member having generally oppositely facing mating and remote surfaces and conductive regions on at least one of the mating and remote surfaces, at least one of the conductive regions being a through hole. The connector includes a dielectric housing having a receiving area for receiving the first electrical component therein and a plurality of terminal receiving cavities extending generally perpendicularly to at least one of the surfaces. The connector further includes a terminal in one of the terminal receiving cavities. The terminal has a body portion, a contact arm extending from the body portion for electrically contacting the first electrical component, a retention portion for retaining the terminal in the cavity, and a board contact extending from the body portion to the through hole. The board contact is a through hole-type tail for extending through the through hole. The tail includes a full segment and an abutting narrowed segment, each segment having edges and a centerline generally perpendicular to the mating surface, the centerline of the narrowed segment being offset from the centerline of the full segment. A transition between the abutting segments is positioned between the mating and remote surfaces of the circuit member when the connector is mounted to the circuit member.

Connector having terminals with improved soldier tails

A locating fixture system is provided for aligning a multi-conductor flat electrical cable with an elongated electrical connector having a plurality of terminals for termination to the conductors of the cable. A fixture base defines a cable platform for supporting the multi-conductor flat electrical cable. A receptacle in the base receives the elongated electrical connector generally transversely of the cable, with the terminals projecting above the cable platform for termination to the conductors of the cable. A locating pin is provided on the base within the receptacle for insertion into a locating hole in the connector intermediate opposite ends of the connector for properly locating the connector transversely of the cable.

Locating fixture system for electrical connectors

An electrical connector assembly is disclosed, along with a method of fabricating the assembly, wherein a dielectric housing has a lower face for mounting on a top surface of a printed circuit board. The housing includes at least one terminal-receiving cavity having an opening in the lower face of the housing. A terminal includes a receptacle portion received in the cavity for mating with a complementary electrical component. The terminal has a solder tail portion projecting from the receptacle portion, past the opening of the cavity, into a hole in the printed circuit board. The receptacle portion of the terminal is located in the cavity spaced from said opening a distance sufficient to prevent solder material from wicking up the solder tail onto the receptacle portion when the solder tail portion is wave soldered from a bottom surface of the printed circuit board.

Anti-wicking electrical connector

A surface mount electrical connector assembly is provided for electrically connecting a plurality of terminals of an electrical connector to circuit traces on a printed circuit board. The terminals are mounted on a dielectric housing of the connector and have contact ends exposed exteriorly on one side of the housing. A flexible circuit sheet is mounted on the side of the housing, with conductive circuit paths being electrically terminated to the contact ends of the terminals. The flexible circuit sheet has an edge for surface engaging the printed circuit board, with contact pads at the edge for electrical termination to the circuit traces on the printed circuit board.

Surface mount electrical connector assembly

A shielded electrical connector is formed by the mating of upper and lower housing covers and is used with twisted pair cables, each of which includes a pair of signal wires and a drain wire enclosed within an outer insulation. Each pair of terminated signal wires is disposed in a contact module which is positioned in one of a plurality of shielded compartments formed between adjacent separating walls extending from the outer housing covers when the covers are mated with each other. Each of the separating walls has a positioning slot into which a positioning rib on the contact modules may be disposed in order to properly position and retain the contact module in one of the shielded compartments. A ferrule assembly is crimped about the end of the insulation of each of the cables and is coupled to the drain wire of the twisted pair cable. A bus bar coupled to ground terminals disposed in contact modules in the connector is positioned within the connector housing so as to be in contact with each of the ferrule assemblies and includes resilient fingers that engage one of the housing covers to thereby couple the drain wires to the ground terminals and the housing covers. A pull tab may be secured to the rear of the connector housing to aid in extracting the connector from an other connector.

Method of making shielded electrical connector

Shielded electrical connector

Shielded electrical connection

An electrical contact having a compliant section for mounting the contact on a circuit board in a plated-through hole. The compliant section includes a section having a configuration which deforms upon insertion into the circuit board hole and creates positive electrical contact at three points. The contact may include a wire wrap tail and an upper pin or post to mate with a connector.

Compliant contact

A preloaded spring contact electrical terminal with a support portion mounted in a fixed position in a housing, an abutment portion and a spring flex portion deformed to preload the abutment portion against a housing cavity wall. A contact portion is axially aligned with and axially spaced from the abutment portion to provide a narrow configuration in which preload force, contact force and insertion force can be optimized while contact wear is reduced.

Preloaded spring contact electrical terminal

An electrical connector assembly including a female receptacle for receiving a mating contact member. The mating contact member is an axially elongated member formed of an electrically conductive material. The female receptacle is formed of an electrically conductive material and has an elongated, tubular body adapted to receive the mating contact member. One of the mating contact member or the tubular body of the female receptacle has a predefined, longitudinally extending rotational skew. The mating contact member has at least one resilient, elongated beam that is progressively deflected along said predefined rotational skew when inserted within the female receptacle.

Spring contact electrical connector assembly having a twist profile

A shielded plug assembly for mating a shielded multi-conductor cable assembly to a shielded receptacle connector and the method of making the same. The plug assembly employs a new type of unitary molded wire positioning member to position and secure the conductors prior to and during insertion of the wire positioning member into the plug assembly housing. The method includes cutting the wires after positioning within the wire positioning member and deforming a portion of the wire positioning member to securely hold the conductors therein. When the plug assembly is terminated to the conductors, the cooperation of the wire positioning member and the plug housing are such that the conductor ends are moved within the housing to assure alignment with corresponding insulation penetrating type terminals.

Growing community of inventors

Willow Springs, IL, United States of America

Irvin R Triner