CN218070243U

CN218070243U - Elastic contact and electric connector

Info

Publication number: CN218070243U
Application number: CN202220771883.6U
Authority: CN
Inventors: 王峰
Original assignee: Phoenix Contact Asia Pacific Nanjing Co Ltd
Current assignee: Phoenix Contact Asia Pacific Nanjing Co Ltd
Priority date: 2022-03-31
Filing date: 2022-03-31
Publication date: 2022-12-16
Anticipated expiration: 2032-03-31
Also published as: WO2023185304A1

Abstract

The present disclosure relates to a resilient contact and an electrical connector. The elastic contact is a cylindrical element including annular portions at both ends, and a plurality of elastic beams connected between the annular portions at both ends. Each spring beam includes a portion forming an outer spring arm and a portion forming an inner spring arm. The outer resilient arm projects radially outwardly of the barrel member to define an outer contact and the inner resilient arm projects radially inwardly of the barrel member to define an inner contact. The outer resilient arm projects outwardly to a different extent than the inner resilient arm projects inwardly along the radial direction of the tubular member. The elastic contact piece provided by the disclosure can improve the electric contact performance, so that the elastic contact piece is suitable for the application occasions of high-voltage and high-current connection under the condition of controlling the size of the elastic contact piece.

Description

Elastic contact and electric connector

Technical Field

The utility model relates to an electrical connection field especially relates to an elastic contact who is used for establishing electric connection and mechanical connection between the public terminal of counterpointing and female terminal.

Background

In the field of electrical connection, electrical connectors are widely used in various electrical lines to transmit current. Electrical connectors typically include a receptacle and a plug that mate with each other. The socket and plug of an electrical connector are each provided with terminals which are usually required to have a better fit to meet the requirements of high current transmission. If the terminals are matched loosely, poor contact is easy to occur, so that the current transmission efficiency is reduced, and even the current transmission is interrupted; however, if the fitting is too tight, the insertion and extraction of the electrical connector are not facilitated.

A crown spring is a resilient contact used to establish electrical and mechanical connections between mating terminals. A typical crown spring is housed within a female terminal and makes electrical and mechanical contact with a male terminal inserted into the female terminal. For example, chinese utility model patent publication No. CN203423290U describes a contact spring for bridging electrical contacts between a contact sleeve (i.e., a female terminal) and a contact pin (i.e., a male terminal). However, there is still room for further improvement in such crown springs in applications such as the development and application of high voltage high current connections.

SUMMERY OF THE UTILITY MODEL

The utility model provides a technical scheme aims at providing a modified hat spring, and its electric contact performance who strengthens the hat spring to can make the hat spring be fit for the application scenario that high-pressure heavy current is connected under the circumstances of control hat spring size.

In an aspect of the present invention, there is provided an elastic contact, the elastic contact is a cylindrical member, the cylindrical member includes annular portions at both ends, and a plurality of elastic beams connected between the annular portions at both ends, each elastic beam includes a portion forming an outer elastic arm and a portion forming an inner elastic arm, the outer elastic arm is along the radially outward side of the cylindrical member is convex to define an outer contact, the inner elastic arm is along the radially inward side of the cylindrical member is convex to define an inner contact, along the radial direction of the cylindrical member, the outward elastic arm is convex to the outer side and the inward side is convex.

In at least one embodiment of an aspect of the present invention, a connection line between two end points of the elastic beam is used as an axis of the elastic beam, and a distance from the inner contact to the axis of the elastic beam is greater than a distance from the outer contact to the axis of the elastic beam.

In at least one embodiment of an aspect of the present invention, a connection line between two end points of the elastic beam is used as an axis of the elastic beam, and a distance from the inner contact to the axis of the elastic beam is smaller than a distance from the outer contact to the axis of the elastic beam.

In at least one embodiment of an aspect of the present invention, the outer resilient arm and the inner resilient arm have unequal arm lengths.

In at least one embodiment of an aspect of the present invention, the outer resilient arm has an arm length greater than an arm length of the inner resilient arm.

In at least one embodiment of one aspect of the present invention, the outer resilient arm has an arm length less than the inner resilient arm, and the outer contact has a distance from the barrel projection of the tubular member less than the inner contact has a distance from the barrel projection of the tubular member.

In at least one embodiment of one aspect of the present invention, the plurality of elastic beams are parallel to each other and aligned at both ends, so that the outer contact of each elastic beam is staggered from the inner contact of the adjacent elastic beam along the circumferential direction of the cylindrical member.

In at least one embodiment of an aspect of the present invention, the resilient contact is formed from a single piece of conductive material.

In at least one embodiment of an aspect of the present invention, the elastic contact is formed by winding the single sheet of conductive material.

In at least one embodiment of an aspect of the present invention, the elastic contact piece wound has a gap between the two ends.

In at least one embodiment of an aspect of the present invention, the elastic contact is a crown spring.

In at least one embodiment of one aspect of the present invention, each of the elastic beams includes one or more of the outer elastic arms, and one or more of the inner elastic arms.

In another aspect of the present invention, there is provided an electrical connector, comprising: a resilient contact as described in any one of the preceding paragraphs; the female terminal is provided with a mounting cavity, the mounting cavity is used for accommodating the elastic contact piece, and the inner wall of the mounting cavity is used for being in contact with at least one part of an outer elastic arm of the elastic contact piece; and a male terminal for insertion into the mounting cavity of the female terminal and contacting at least a portion of the inner resilient arm of the resilient contact.

Drawings

To further clarify the above and other advantages and features of various embodiments of the present invention, a more particular description of various embodiments of the invention will be rendered by reference to the appended drawings. It is appreciated that these drawings depict only typical embodiments of the invention and are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope.

Fig. 1 shows a perspective view of a crown spring according to an embodiment of the invention.

Fig. 2 shows an inside plan view of a crown spring before winding according to an embodiment of the invention.

Fig. 3 shows a side view of a crown spring before winding according to an embodiment of the invention.

Fig. 4 shows a side view of the crown spring according to the perspective a in fig. 1, according to an embodiment of the invention.

Fig. 5 shows a schematic diagram of three of the crown spring, the female terminal and the male terminal before installation in the electrical connector according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Fig. 6 shows a schematic diagram of a male terminal and a female terminal with a crown spring installed in an electrical connector according to an embodiment of the present invention before installation.

Reference numerals:

1. electrical connector

10. Crown spring

11A first annular portion

11B second annular portion

13A first end

13B second end

12. Elastic beam

121. Outer elastic arm

123. Inner spring arm

125. Joining

14. Second gap

15. First gap

20. Female terminal

21. Mounting cavity

30. Male terminal

31 outer wall of male terminal

Detailed Description

The present invention will be further described with reference to the following embodiments and drawings, and more details will be set forth in the following description in order to provide a thorough understanding of the present invention, but it is obvious that the present invention can be implemented in various other ways different from those described herein, and those skilled in the art can similarly popularize and deduce the present invention according to the actual application without departing from the spirit of the present invention, and therefore, the scope of the present invention should not be limited by the contents of the embodiments.

This application uses specific language to describe embodiments of the application. Reference to "one embodiment," "another embodiment," and/or "some embodiments" means that a particular feature, structure, or characteristic described in connection with at least one embodiment of the application. Therefore, it is emphasized and should be appreciated that two or more references to "one embodiment" or "another embodiment" or "some embodiments" in various places in the specification are not necessarily all referring to the same embodiment. Furthermore, some features, structures, or characteristics of one or more embodiments of the present application may be combined as appropriate.

It should be noted that in order to simplify the present disclosure and thereby facilitate an understanding of one or more embodiments, various features are sometimes grouped together in a single embodiment, figure, or description thereof for the purpose of streamlining the disclosure herein. This method of disclosure, however, is not intended to require more features than are expressly recited in the claims. Indeed, embodiments may have fewer than all of the features of a single embodiment disclosed below.

Referring to fig. 1-4, fig. 1 shows a perspective view of a crown spring 10 according to one embodiment of the present invention. Fig. 2 shows an inside plan view of crown spring 10 before winding according to an embodiment of the invention. Fig. 3 shows a side view of the crown spring 10 before winding according to an embodiment of the invention. Fig. 4 shows a side view of the crown spring according to perspective a in fig. 1, according to an embodiment of the invention. Referring to fig. 1, the crown spring 10 may have a substantially cylindrical structure including a first annular portion 11A and a second annular portion 11B at both ends, respectively, and a plurality of elastic beams 12 connected between the first annular portion 11A and the second annular portion 11B. Based on this cylindrical structure of crown spring 10, an inner side I and an outer side E may be defined. In the hoop direction of the cylinder, the crown spring 10 may have a first end 13A and a second end 13B, wherein the first end 13A and the second end 13B may have a first gap 15 therebetween. The size of the first gap 15 can be adjusted as desired. Referring to fig. 2, crown spring 10 may be formed from a single piece of conductive material, and may be formed by coiling a first end 13A and a second end 13B of the single piece of conductive material toward inner side I, as shown in fig. 1, to form crown spring 10 having a cylindrical structure.

As shown in fig. 1-2, the crown spring 10 may include a plurality of elastic beams 12, the elastic beams 12 may be disposed parallel to each other and aligned at both ends, and adjacent elastic beams 12 may have a second gap 14 therebetween. Each spring beam 12 may include a portion forming an outer spring arm 121 and a portion forming an inner spring arm 123. In the radial direction of the cylindrical structure of the crown spring 10, the outer resilient arm 121 projects outward to define an outer contact point, and the inner resilient arm 123 projects inward to define an inner contact point.

The resilient beams 12 positioned adjacently may be arranged oppositely so that the outer resilient arm 121 of each resilient beam 12 may be adjacent to the corresponding inner resilient arm 123 of the adjacent resilient beam 12, in other words, the outer contact of each resilient beam is staggered with the inner contact of the adjacent resilient beam along the circumferential direction of the cylindrical member.

Referring to fig. 3, when a line connecting two end points of the elastic beam 12 is a longitudinal axis L of the elastic beam, a distance from an inner contact (e.g., a male pin contact) defined by the inner elastic arm 123 to the axis L of the elastic beam is greater than a distance from an outer contact (e.g., a female pin contact) defined by the outer elastic arm 123 to the axis L of the elastic beam. In other embodiments, the distance from the inner contact (e.g., a male pin contact) defined by the inner spring arm 123 to the spring beam axis L may be less than the distance from the outer contact (e.g., a female pin contact) defined by the outer spring arm 123 to the spring beam axis L.

The arm length of the outer spring arm 121 may be determined to be equal to the arc length of the outwardly convex outer spring arm 121. Similarly, the arm length of the inner spring arm 123 may be determined to be equal to the arc length of the inwardly projecting inner spring arm 123. In some embodiments, as shown in fig. 1-2, an outwardly projecting outer spring arm 121 and an inwardly projecting inner spring arm 123 may meet at a junction 125. The joint 125 is preferably offset from the center of the spring beam, i.e. the arm length of the outer spring arm 121 is different from the arm length of the inner spring arm 123. For example, the arm length of the outer spring arm 121 on the same spring beam 12 may be smaller or larger than the arm length of the inner spring arm 123 on the same spring beam 12. Referring to fig. 4, the outer resilient arm 121 and the inner resilient arm 123 on the same beam 12 may be different from each other in the degree of outward protrusion, so that the inner contact defined by the inner resilient arm 123 is more protruded than the outer contact defined by the outer resilient arm in the view of fig. 4. In other words, the distance by which the outer resilient arm 121 projects outward is smaller than the distance by which the inner resilient arm 123 projects inward in the radial direction of the cylinder. In other embodiments, the outer resilient arm 121 may protrude outward a greater distance than the inner resilient arm 123 protrudes inward in the radial direction of the cylinder.

In the application shown in fig. 5-6, the force generated based on the spring deformation is more required between crown spring 10 and male terminal 30 than female terminal 20 to ensure reliable contact. Therefore, by designing the outer spring arm 121 and the inner spring arm 123 on the same elastic beam 12 differently, the acting force generated by the spring deformation can be more concentrated on the inner side (I side of fig. 3, side in contact with the male terminal) of the crown spring 10. Thus, the crown spring 10 achieves better resilience with smaller dimensions (e.g., shorter spring beams 12), thereby improving the current transfer efficiency of the electrical connector 1 (as shown in fig. 5-6 below).

As shown in fig. 3, since the elastic beams 12 at adjacent positions are arranged in a mirror image, the crown spring 10 has no forward and reverse directions in assembly, so that the error-proof design is eliminated and the consistency of the insertion and extraction force is ensured.

Although in the above described embodiments each resilient beam 12 comprises only one outer resilient arm 121 and one inner resilient arm 123, in other embodiments each resilient beam 12 may comprise one or more outer resilient arms 121 and one or more inner resilient arms 123.

Referring to fig. 5-6, fig. 5 shows a schematic view of three of the crown spring 10, the female terminal 20 and the male terminal 30 before installation in the electrical connector 1 according to an embodiment of the present invention. Fig. 6 shows a schematic view of a male terminal 30 and a female terminal 20 with a crown spring 10 mounted thereon in an electrical connector 1 according to an embodiment of the present invention before mounting.

As shown in fig. 5, male terminal 30 may have a mounting cavity 21, and mounting cavity 21 may be used to accommodate crown spring 10 and male terminal 30. The shape and size of crown spring 10 and male terminal 30 may match the shape and size of mounting cavity 21 of female terminal 20 to fit the mounting. As shown in fig. 6, when crown spring 10 is mounted into mounting cavity 21 of female terminal 20, the inner wall of mounting cavity 21 may contact at least a portion (e.g., an outer contact) of outer resilient arm 121 of crown spring 10. When male terminal 30 is inserted into mounting cavity 21 of female terminal 20 to which crown spring 10 is mounted, outer wall 31 of male terminal 30 may contact at least a portion (e.g., an inner contact) of inner resilient arm 123 of crown spring 10. When the crown spring 10, the female terminal 20 and the male terminal 30 of the electrical connector 1 are installed together, there may be an interaction force between the inner wall of the female terminal 20 and the outer resilient arm 121 of the crown spring 10, and there may be an interaction force between the outer wall 31 of the male terminal 30 and the inner resilient arm 123 of the crown spring 10, which may improve the connection reliability between the female terminal 20 and the male terminal 30 and further improve the current transmission efficiency of the electrical connector 1.

In other variations, the outer contact defined by the outer spring arm may be more convex than the inner contact defined by the inner spring arm, thereby concentrating the spring force between the crown spring and the female terminal.

In the above embodiment, the elastic contact member denoted by reference numeral 10 is referred to as a "crown spring". It should be understood that a more generalized spring contact should encompass a cylindrical element that includes loop portions at both ends, and a plurality of spring beams connected between the loop portions at both ends.

While the present invention has been described in accordance with the preferred embodiments of the present disclosure, it is not intended to be limited thereto, but rather only by the scope set forth in the following claims. It will be appreciated by persons skilled in the art that various modifications and changes may be made to the embodiments described herein without departing from the broader spirit and scope of the invention as set forth in the appended claims.

Claims

1. An elastic contact piece is a cylindrical element which comprises annular parts at two ends and a plurality of elastic beams connected between the annular parts at the two ends,

wherein each of the elastic beams includes a portion forming an outer elastic arm protruding outward in a radial direction of the cylindrical member to define an outer contact, and a portion forming an inner elastic arm protruding inward in the radial direction of the cylindrical member to define an inner contact,

in the radial direction of the cylindrical element, the degree of outward protrusion of the outer spring arm and the degree of inward protrusion of the inner spring arm are different.

2. The spring contact of claim 1, wherein a line connecting two ends of the spring beam is defined as a spring beam axis, and the distance from the inner contact to the spring beam axis is greater than the distance from the outer contact to the spring beam axis.

3. The spring contact of claim 1, wherein a line connecting two ends of the spring beam is defined as a spring beam axis, and a distance from the inner contact to the spring beam axis is smaller than a distance from the outer contact to the spring beam axis.

4. The spring contact of claim 1, wherein the outer spring arm and the inner spring arm are of unequal arm lengths.

5. The spring contact of claim 4, wherein the outer spring arm has an arm length greater than an arm length of the inner spring arm.

6. The resilient contact of claim 4, wherein the outer spring arm has an arm length less than the arm length of the inner spring arm, and wherein the outer contact projects from the barrel of the barrel member a distance less than the inner contact projects from the barrel of the barrel member.

7. The spring contact of any one of claims 1-6, wherein the plurality of spring beams are parallel to one another and aligned at opposite ends such that the outer contact of each spring beam is staggered from the inner contact of an adjacent spring beam along a circumferential direction of the barrel member.

8. The spring contact of any of claims 1-6, wherein the spring contact is formed from a single piece of conductive material.

9. The spring contact of claim 8, wherein the spring contact is formed by rolling the single sheet of conductive material.

10. The spring contact of claim 9, wherein the wrapped spring contact has a gap between the ends.

11. The spring contact of claim 1, wherein the spring contact is a crown spring.

12. The spring contact of claim 1, wherein each spring beam includes one or more of the outer spring arms and one or more of the inner spring arms.

13. An electrical connector, comprising:

the elastic contact of any one of claims 1-12;

the female terminal is provided with a mounting cavity, the mounting cavity is used for accommodating the elastic contact piece, and the inner wall of the mounting cavity is used for being in contact with at least one part of an outer elastic arm of the elastic contact piece; and

a male terminal for insertion into the mounting cavity of the female terminal and contact with at least a portion of an inner spring arm of the resilient contact.