Shunt

The subject shunt connector has an integral housing of rigid insulative material and a single terminal mounted therein. The housing defines a pair of parallel, spaced male or pin terminal receiving passages extending between front and rear faces, and a slot interconnecting portions of the passages. The terminal has a pair of parallel contact arms interconnected at opposite ends by cross bars and a tine intermediate the arms. The terminal is so mounted in the housing that it can engage a pin terminal inserted from either face of the connector without being damaged or dislodged.

The present invention relates to a shunt connector and in particular to a 
shunt connector which cannot be improperly mounted on a pair of adjacent 
pin terminals. 
Terminal junction or shunt systems are well known in the electrical and 
electronic arts since it is frequently necessary to temporarily 
interconnect two or more adjacent terminals. Terminal junction wiring 
systems generally employ single or multiple modules in the form of a 
housing of rigid insulating material, conventionally of rectangular 
configuration, incorporating means for physically mounting the housing in 
a support wherein a plurality of such housings may be mounted in 
side-by-side fashion depending upon the number of electrical 
interconnection being made. Each housing is provided with a pair of 
terminal receiving cavities which extend in parallel spaced fashion within 
the housing. Conventionally the shunt terminal is generally formed by 
standard receptacle terminals joined by a metallic bus strip, with the bus 
strip being folded to draw the terminals closer together for insertion 
into the closely spaced cavities in the housing. This type of shunt 
connector has several disadvantages in that, first, it is expensive to 
manufacture the conventional receptacle terminals for a shunt purpose and, 
second, it requires additional steps to bend the carrier strip for proper 
spacing of the formed terminals. A further disadvantage is that there is 
the possibility of improper (reversed) mounting of the shunt which will 
result in either destruction of the shunt itself or, at the very least, an 
improper shunt being established. 
It should further be appreciated that shunt connectors of the present type 
are generally used for shunting pin terminals that are on 0.100 and 0.200 
inch centers. Therefore the connectors themselves are rather small making 
it difficult to determine which is the mounting end and which is the back 
end of the connector. 
The present invention concerns a shunt connector having an insulative 
housing defining a pair of closely spaced, parallel terminal receiving 
passages and a single shunt terminal mounted in said housing and exposed 
in the passages so that good electrical and mechanical contact can be made 
between the shunt terminal and a pair of terminal pins inserted into the 
respective passages from either end thereof.

The subject shunt connector 10 comprises a housing 12 and a terminal 14 
received therein. The shunt connector is used to interconnect pairs of 
closely spaced pin terminals 16. 
The housing 12 is an integral rectangular member of rigid plastics material 
defining a pair of parallel closely spaced terminal passages 18, 20 
extending between a mating face 22 and an oppositely directed rear surface 
24. A transverse slot 26 interconnects the passages 18, 20 within the 
housing and defines a lug or stop 28 projecting from a first inner wall 30 
towards an opposite inner wall 32. Each passage 18, 20 has oppositely 
directed flared entrys 34, 36, 38, 40, respectively. Each passage 18, 20 
further includes a side ramp 42, 44 forming a shelf 46, 48. 
The terminal 14 is stamped and formed from a single strip of conventional 
conducting material and includes a pair of parallel spaced contact arms 
50, 52 joined at their opposite ends by cross bars 54, 56. A latching tine 
58 extends from the cross bar 54 to lie between the parallel spaced 
contact arms 50, 52. It will best be appreciated from FIG. 3 that the 
contact arms 50, 52 have a bowed longitudinal configuration with a portion 
60 intermediate the cross bars 54, 56 having the maximum arc. The tine 58 
has a first portion 62 which is bent in a direction opposite the contact 
arms and then has a portion 64 reversedly bent beyond itself so that the 
free end 66 extends in the direction of the contact arms. The terminal 14 
also includes a pair of lateral flanges 68, 70. 
The present invention is assembled by simply slipping the terminal 14 from 
the rear 24 of housing 12 into the passages 18, 20 and slot 26 with the 
cross bar 54 leading. The flanges 68, 70 will encounter and ride up ramps 
42, 44 to seat on shelves 46, 48. At the same time tine 58 will ride over 
stop 28. This will bring the terminal into a stable position with cross 
bars 54 and 56 engaging wall 32 and portions 60 of the contact arms lying 
in the respective passages 18, 20 spaced from wall 30. 
It will be appreciated from a comparison of FIGS. 3 and 4 that the tine 58 
engaging with the lug 28 will prevent the terminal 14 from being displaced 
from the housing 12 by a terminal entering from mating face 22. It will 
also be apparent from these Figures that because the contact arms 50, 52 
are bowed and lie in the respective passages 18, 20 that a pin terminal 16 
can be received in the subject shunt connector from either the mating 22 
or rear 24 ends thereof without damaging or displacing the terminal 14.