Board-to-Board Connector Spring Layout for Lower Impedance
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing board-to-board connectors face challenges in reducing impedance without altering the pitch or elasticity of contacts, as techniques such as narrowing the pitch or widening the contacts lead to impractical positioning accuracy or contact hardening issues.
Innovation Solution
The method involves designing contacts with two parallel spring pieces that are separated in the pitch direction, maintaining the predetermined pitch and cross-sectional areas, and eliminating conductors between these pieces to reduce impedance while maintaining elasticity, with the spring pieces forming a U-shape and being supported by an insulating housing with partition walls.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Object-affected harmful factors
If the pitch of contacts is narrowed to reduce impedance, then impedance is reduced, but positioning accuracy requirements become impractically strict
Solution Approach 1:
The contact structure is segmented into two separate spring pieces instead of a single continuous contact. This segmentation allows the gap between spring pieces to be optimized for impedance reduction while the pitch between contacts remains unchanged, thereby resolving the contradiction between impedance reduction and positioning accuracy requirements
Solution Approach 2:
The invention introduces a new dimensional parameter - the gap between spring pieces within a contact - to control impedance. This shifts the impedance control mechanism from the pitch dimension (distance between contacts) to the intra-contact dimension (gap between spring pieces), allowing impedance reduction without affecting pitch or positioning accuracy
2Object-affected harmful factors
If the width of each contact is widened to reduce impedance, then impedance is reduced, but the contact becomes hardened and likely to settle
Solution Approach 1:
Dividing the contact into two narrower spring pieces maintains the electrical conductivity needed for signal transmission while avoiding the hardening effect that occurs with wide contacts. The segmented structure preserves elasticity because each spring piece remains thin and flexible
Solution Approach 2:
The spring pieces are designed with different local characteristics - they are thin and flexible in the regions that need to maintain elasticity, while the gap between them creates the effective width reduction for impedance control. This local differentiation resolves the contradiction between reducing impedance and maintaining flexibility
Data Source
AI summary
Each contact is designed in such a way that one contact part is supported by two spring pieces extending apart from each other and parallel to each other in a pitch direction and whose both ends are joined. No conductor is designed to exist between the two spring pieces of each contact. No conductor is designed to exist between the two contacts adjacent in the pitch direction. An outer spring gap is narrowed by separating the two spring pieces of each contact away from each other in the pitch direction while maintaining the predetermined pitch and the cross-sectional areas and cross-sectional shapes of the two spring pieces of each contact, thereby reducing the impedance of each contact while maintaining the predetermined pitch and the elasticity of each contact.