Page 9 - ConnectorSupplier.com Mil/Aero Handbook

DFA Reduces the Cost Impact of High-Reliability Connectors in Military and Aerospace Applications
Ann Cibelli, Director of Communications, Advanced Interconnections Corp.
Military and aerospace applications often require high-reliability connectors to meet performance requirements not possible with lower- cost commodity connectors. One of the ways to offset the additional expense of high-reliability (hi-rel) connectors is to consider how they could be redesigned to reduce overall applied costs. Utilizing custom connectors made with design for assembly (DFA) in mind can lower production costs by incorporating value-added features.
Unlike standard, off-the-shelf connectors, custom designs can be optimized for a speci c application, taking into account not only performance and end-product integration requirements, but the sometimes-overlooked assembly process as well. Rather than staf ng or designing a production line to accommodate assembly challenges, connectors can be customized to reduce assembly time and even eliminate production steps.
Figure 1: This LED socket for high shock and vibration applications utilizes a customized Peel-A-Way® Removable Terminal Carrier from Advanced Interconnections Corp. to reduce assembly time by eliminating the hand-loading of individual socket terminals.
For example, screw-machined terminals (sockets) with multi- nger contacts are often designed into military and aerospace products for their high-reliability performance in high shock and vibration environments. Instead of ordering loose socket terminals and assembling them onto printed circuit boards (PCB) by hand, a removable carrier can provide sockets or pins in the exact pattern needed (Figure 1).
Carriers can be exible or rigid, hold multiple different terminal styles, and employ cut-outs to accommodate other components already placed on a PCB. By using a carrier, hand-loading steps are dramatically reduced or even replaced by automated pick-and-place assembly. Removable carriers offer complete solder joint visibility and improved air ow, and also improve quality by ensuring that the right pin goes in the right hole every time. Additionally, value-added features — such as stand-offs, guide pins, keyed and polarized shrouds, and even simple connector covers — can simultaneously reduce assembly time and improve production throughput by protecting delicate contacts, terminals, and leads during transportation and assembly (Figure 2). Further, the use of solder preform terminals can eliminate the need for wave soldering in a solder-re ow environment, like surface mount production lines where the only through-hole components are board-to-board connectors or device sockets.
Selecting a connector supplier that has the in-house capabilities to produce quick, cost-effective prototypes helps ensure that custom designs meet an application’s unique performance and assembly requirements before investing in production tooling. Working directly with vertically-integrated connector suppliers also allows customers to leverage the expertise of a company’s product design engineers, enabling the timely development of prototypes that can easily be changed and optimized as the design of the end-product is nalized.
When amortized over the entire production order, the development costs for custom high-reliability connectors are often minimal and easily offset by savings realized during volume assembly. While the unit price of custom
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