JPS5810975Y2 - Multi-point contacts used in electronic components - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to an elastic multi-contact contactor for use in small electronic mechanical components such as small variable resistors or switches.

It is desirable that the movable contact that slides on the resistor of a variable resistor or the switch fixed electrode of a switch has stable contact resistance and as low as possible, and that it has a long sliding life.

Here, it is known that increasing the contact pressure of the movable contactor lowers and stabilizes the contact resistance, but in this case there is a problem that wear between the contacts increases and the sliding life is shortened.

It is also known that the contact resistance of the contact portion of a sliding contactor decreases as the number of mutually independent contacts increases, and that the contact resistance decreases in inverse proportion to the number N of contact points. The greater the number of contact points, the higher the reliability of contact.

In addition, in a variable resistor, the sliding noise decreases as the number of mutually independent contacts increases, and in the case of a switch, the performance improves as the number of mutually independent contacts increases in terms of noise and chatter during switching. has been improved.

Conventionally, electronic components have become smaller for performance and cost reduction reasons, and for the contact width that can be designed, the largest number of individual contact pieces are independent of each other.
Furthermore, it is desired that the contact portion of each contact piece satisfy the performance as a contact point.

There are many structures for these multi-point contacts, and the main ones are: (1) Metal wire coiled.

(Utility Publication Showa 44-5631, Utility Publication Showa 49-68636, etc.)
(2) Parts of multiple metal wires that are in close contact with each other are bonded together by plating or soldering, and then processed into an appropriate shape.

(Special Publication No. 53-102, Special Publication No. 53-1465, etc.) (3) A metal plate punched into a comb shape and then processed into an appropriate shape.

(4) A metal plate is cut by shearing and spread out into a fan shape to form a large number of legs of different lengths, which are then bent diagonally to the longitudinal direction of the legs and further processed into an appropriate shape. .

(U.S. Patent No. 3974471, U.S. Patent No. 3569897) and so on.

However, the above (1) and (2) are wire sliders, and the one in (1) has the disadvantage that the independence of each contact point is insufficient, and it also requires an auxiliary means such as an additional elastic body such as elastic rubber. There were factors that increased costs, such as:

In addition, the method (2) above requires a large number of manufacturing steps and is expensive, and the method (3) above, which has been conventionally used, requires a large number of comb-shaped contact pieces and the width of each contact piece. The gap between them cannot be made very narrow in terms of the mechanical strength of the punch, so there is a limit to the number of contact pieces that can be made from a metal plate of a certain width, and the number of multiple contact pieces is limited. It was reduced by the total gap between them.

Also, for the item (4) above, the number of contact pieces is (3
) Since the gap between the contact pieces can be narrowed compared to the comb-shaped slider of However, the process of independently providing the minimum gap between each contact element has the disadvantage that it is quite complicated and requires a precise processing process.

Furthermore, in general, the above (1), (2), and (4) have small contact pressure and spring range per contacting element, and are not reliable enough, making it difficult to ensure stable contact individually. It was difficult and I regret it.

The present invention improves the above-mentioned drawbacks, and in particular relates to the improvement of the structure (4), and aims to improve ease of manufacture and reliability.

The structure of a multi-contact contact 11' shown in US Pat. No. 3,974,471 as an example of a conventional product of this type is shown in FIG. 6A-9.

That is, Figure A is a plan view of the state after shearing and before bending, where 2' indicates the cut, and 5' indicates the narrow plate-shaped part that forms the contact piece 6' after the cut 2'. , d, and e indicate bent portions.

The opening in the figure is a perspective view showing the state after bending by d and e.

Here, 7' indicates the narrow gap between the contact pieces, and 10'
indicates a contact protrusion, and 11' indicates a multi-contact contactor.

As shown above, by bending d and e, a narrow gap 7' is formed in the cut 2' between the contact pieces, and each contact piece does not come into contact with each other and is independent. ing.

However, the above-described method has the disadvantage that the processing steps are complicated and processing is difficult, and that the contact piece 6' tends to lack independence and uniformity near its base.

The present invention improves these conventional drawbacks, and its gist is that following the connecting part 3 at one end of the band-shaped elastic metal plate,
A plurality of narrow contact pieces 6 each having a V-shaped or U-shaped cross section, a contact protrusion 10 near the tip, and bent in a diagonal shape from the connecting portion 10 are arranged between each of the narrow contact pieces 6. These are multi-contact contacts used for small electronic components, which are individually provided close to each other while maintaining a very small gap 7, and the connecting portion 3 is provided with means for fixing to the slider mounting body.

An embodiment of the present invention will be explained with reference to FIGS. 1 to 5 according to the manufacturing process.

Figures 1 to 5 show the manufacturing process of the multi-contact contactor of the present invention. Figure 1 is a plan view after the cutting process and Figure 2 is a drawing process on the contact piece along the cuts. Fig. 3 is a side view after bending and processing of the contact protrusion, Fig. 4 is a cross section taken along the line A-A in Fig. 2; 5 shows a V-shaped drawing process, and FIG. 5 shows a perspective view before cutting one of the connecting parts.

In FIG. 1, 1 is a spring metal plate or band, 2 is a cut made by shearing, and connecting parts 3 and 4 are provided at both ends.
is left behind.

A plurality of narrow plate portions 5 of the same shape formed in the middle of the cut 2 have an arcuate, V-shaped, or U-shaped cross section, as shown in FIGS. 2 and 4. A plurality of contact pieces 6 are formed by drawing parallel to the length direction, so that a substantially constant and very narrow gap 7 is provided between each contact piece 6.

Therefore, when the apertures on both side surfaces of each contact piece 6 are developed into a plane, the minute gaps 7 come into contact with each other over the entire area of each side surface.

Next, as shown in FIG.
It is bent downward in the vicinity 3d.

This bending process 3d can be performed simultaneously with the above-mentioned drawing process.

At this time, for the sake of spring performance and ease of machining, the bent portion 3d is preferably bent at a flat portion outside the drawn portion, as shown in FIG. 3, excluding the drawn portion.

The connecting portion 3 is also provided with mounting means such as a mounting hole 8 or a mounting piece 9 as shown in FIG. will be established.

Each contact piece 6 has contact protrusions 10 protruding downward so as to be lined up in a line at right angles to the longitudinal direction near the connecting part 4 on the opposite side of the connecting part 3 having the attachment means.

By cutting each contact piece 6 at the two-dot chain line part B between the contact protrusion 10 and the connecting part 4 shown in FIG. 5, the contact protrusion 10 of each contact 6 has independent elasticity. It becomes a point of contact.

Note that, as shown in FIG. 3, after drawing, the distance between the connecting portion 4 and the contact protrusion 10 is made sufficiently long without cutting along the chain line B, and instead the connecting portion 4 is cut along the chain line 14. You can also bend it upwards like this.

Since the multi-contact contactor 11 of the present invention is constructed as described above, it is relatively easy to process without complicated three-dimensional precision machining. It is easy to process, has high productivity, and is highly reliable.

(b) The utilization rate of materials is high, and in addition to the factors mentioned in (b), the cost is low.

(c) With the same width, more contact pieces can be formed compared to the conventionally used comb-shaped multi-contact contactor (3).

(d) Each contact piece can contact each other while maintaining independence.

(E) Because of the arcuate or V-shaped ribs, the rigidity of each contact piece is relatively high, and sufficient contact pressure can be maintained even when the contact piece is downsized.

etc., it is possible to obtain a multi-contact contactor with great practical effects.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Figures 1 to 5 show the manufacturing process of the multi-contact contactor of the present invention. Figure 1 is a plan view after the cutting process and Figure 2 is a drawing process on the contact piece along the cuts. Fig. 3 is a side view after bending and processing of the contact protrusion, Fig. 4 is a cross section taken along the line A-A in Fig. FIG. 5 shows the V-shaped drawing process, and is a perspective view before cutting one of the connecting parts. Figure 6 shows a conventional example, where A is a plan view before bending;
FIG. 3 is a perspective view after the bending process. 1: Spring metal plate, 2: Cut, 3, 4: Connecting part, 5:
Narrow plate-shaped portion, 6: contact piece, 7: gap, 10: contact protrusion, 11: multi-contact contact of the present invention, B: cutting line.

Claims (2)

[Scope of utility model registration request] (1) Following the connecting part 3 at one end of the band-shaped elastic metal plate, the plate has a V-shaped or U-shaped cross section and has a contact protrusion 10 near the tip, and is bent downward from the connecting part 3 in the shape of a letter. A plurality of narrow contact pieces 6 are individually provided in close proximity to each other with a very small gap 7 between them, and the connecting portion 3 is provided with means for fixing it to the slider mounting body. Multi-point contactor used for small electronic parts. (2) A multi-contact contactor for use in a small electronic component according to claim 1, which is a utility model registration and is formed by integrally connecting the tips of each contactor piece 6.