Flexible Power Rail Busbar Assembly for Electronics Housing
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Solution Overview
Problem
Generic contact and busbar assemblies have complex structures, making them expensive to manufacture while lacking cost-effectiveness and flexibility to accommodate tolerances in electronics housing arrangements.
Innovation Solution
A simplified contact and busbar assembly design featuring flexible power rail strips and deflectable socket contacts that can align obliquely with power rail strips, allowing for tolerance compensation and secure electrical connections, thereby reducing manufacturing costs and enhancing reliability.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a complex contact and busbar assembly structure is used, then connection reliability is improved, but manufacturing cost increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines the contact element and busbar into a single integrated assembly, eliminating the need for separate components and complex assembly processes. This merging reduces manufacturing cost while maintaining connection reliability through the unified design that ensures proper alignment and electrical contact.
Solution Approach 2:
The contact and busbar assembly is designed to serve multiple functions simultaneously: providing electrical contact, serving as a busbar for current distribution, and accommodating tolerance compensation. This multi-functionality reduces the overall system complexity and manufacturing cost while maintaining reliable connections.
2Stability of the object's composition
If a rigid busbar structure is used, then structural stability is improved, but adaptability to tolerance variations deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The busbar is designed with flexible sections that can deform elastically to accommodate tolerance variations in the electronics housings. This dynamic capability allows the rigid-looking structure to adapt to positional variations while maintaining structural stability and reliable electrical contact.
Solution Approach 2:
The busbar incorporates sections with changed physical parameters (flexibility) in specific locations. These flexible sections have different rigidity parameters compared to the main busbar structure, enabling them to deform and compensate for tolerance variations while the overall structure maintains its stability.
3Ease of manufacture
If a simplified contact and busbar assembly structure is used, then manufacturing cost is reduced, but connection reliability deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
By merging the contact element and busbar into a single assembly with integrated tolerance compensation features, the design achieves both simplification (lower manufacturing cost) and reliability (through ensured proper alignment and contact) simultaneously, resolving the contradiction between cost and reliability.
4Adaptability or versatility
If a flexible power rail strip is used, then adaptability to tolerance variations is improved, but structural stability deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The flexible power rail strip uses elastic deformation to adapt to tolerance variations while maintaining structural stability. The flexibility is not a weakness but a controlled dynamic property that allows the strip to return to its original position after deformation, ensuring stable connections.
Solution Approach 2:
The power rail strip incorporates flexible sections designed as thin-walled or laminated structures that provide the necessary elasticity for tolerance compensation while maintaining sufficient structural stability for reliable electrical contact and mechanical support.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution provides a cost-effective, flexible, and reliable busbar assembly capable of efficiently relaying energy and data, accommodating structural tolerances through flexible power rail strips and adaptable socket contacts, ensuring secure connections across electronics housings.
Implementation Method 1
One or more power rail strips (3, 3') having at least one flexible and deformable section (30a, 31a) are provided. Due to the flexible design of the power rail strips, tolerances in the structure resulting, for example, from the arrangement of the electronics housing on a mounting base and also resulting from the tolerances of the components used can be compensated for in a simple manner.
Implementation Method 2
The socket contacts are designed in such a way that they are insertable into power rail strips not only extending in parallel but also obliquely in relation to the array direction. The assembly has contacts which are deflectable in such a way to contact a power rail aligned obliquely relative to the array direction.
Data Source
AI summary
A contact and busbar assembly forms a bus system on electronics housings arranged in an array. An electronics assembly such as a circuit board is arranged in each housing. The contact and busbar assembly includes multiple bus plugs each having first connecting contacts for contacting a respective circuit board, second terminal contacts in the form of one or more socket contacts and power rail strips. The power rail strips have at least one flexibly deformable section or are continuously flexibly deformable. Alternatively, the socket contacts are insertable not only parallel but also obliquely in relation to the power rail strips extending in the direction of the array for contact by the socket contacts.