Patent ID: 7001212

Claim:
A surface mountable retention bracket for use in an electrical connector having a housing with outwardly extending mounting flanges along a mounting face thereof, each said flange including two vertical enclosed channels extending therethrough to said mounting face with a partition therebetween, said channels being interconnected by a slot undercutting the partition, said retention bracket comprising: a retention bracket has a generally reversed U-shaped configuration and includes a vertical base having opposed long sides and opposed short sides, pair of mounting legs extending downwardly from opposite sides of a lower long side of the base, and a retention tab extending downwardly from said lower long side of said base intermediate said pair of mounting legs, said retention tab is located on a same plane with said base and said pair of mounting legs; said base retained in the slot and said pair of mounting legs extending through the channels and beyond said mounting face so as to be soldered onto a printed circuit board; said retention bracket further includes a retention tab inserted into a recess defined in the partition; said retention tab has at least one retention protrusion in opposite sides thereof for securing said retention bracket to said mounting flange of the housing; said base has a stop surface within a cutout formed between each mounting leg and the retention tab engageable with an upper surface of said partition to provide mechanical support to hold said housing to a printed circuit board when the connector is unmated from a complementary connector.