The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
May. 16, 2000
Filed:
Apr. 18, 1996
Claudine M McCluskey, Bridgewater, MA (US);
Gary A Baker, North Scituate, RI (US);
Texas Instruments Incorporated, Dallas, TX (US);
Abstract
As assembly of normally open pressure responsive electric switches (10a-10e) is provided using a single lead frame (8) for forming respective discontinuous annuli (12) to serve as contact surfaces for pressure responsive discs (42) and a center contact (14) for each respective discontinuous annulus. The lead frame is overmolded with electrically insulative plastic and the circuit paths are electrically separated from one another by severing selected interconnecting runners (40). Each switching station has a disc (42) sealed by a flexible layer (47) and an O-ring (48). A separate lead (26) can be provided for adding switches of an opposite logic, i.e., normally closed, and a thermistor (38) can be included, if desired. The normally closed switches can be modular or the switches (100, 200) can have contacts formed from the lead frame (89).