Cable end connector with connecting bar

1. Field of the invention

The present invention relates to a cable end connector which has a connecting bar.

2. Description of Related Art

A conventional cable end connector includes a connector body and cables. The connector body includes a plurality of conductive terminals connecting with corresponding wires of the cables. Since the signal terminals discrete from grounding terminals with larger spaces, at least one wire of the cable need step across several terminals to connect with corresponding terminal, resulting in a difficult to arrange the wires and a bad shielding of cross-talk of the grounding terminals.

An improved cable end connector is desired.

An object of the present invention is to provide a cable end connector with connecting bar.

In order to achieve above-mentioned object, a cable end connector comprises an insulating housing defining a rear cable-location portion thereof, a plurality of conductive terminals comprising contacting portions and terminal portions located in the rear cable-location portion, a plurality of cables each having wires and a connecting bar defining a first touching end and a second touching end. The wires of the cable overlap the terminal portions one by one except one wire and one terminal portion. The first touching end overlap one terminal portion and the second touch end overlaps said one wire so as to establish an electrical connection through the connecting bar between said one terminal portion and one wire.

Other objects, advantages and novel features of the present invention will become more apparent from the following detailed description of the present embodiment when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 is a perspective front view of a cable end connector in accordance with the present invention;

FIG. 2 is an exploded perspective view of the cable end connector; and

FIG. 3 is a perspective view of terminals and a cable connected with each other.

Reference will now be made to the drawing figures to describe the preferred embodiment of the present invention in detail.

Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2 , a cable end connector 100 compatible to HDMI D Type defined High-Definition Multimedia Interface Specification Version 1.4, which transferring differential signal. The connector includes an insulating housing 10 , a plurality of conductive terminals 20 and a shell 30 shielding the connector.

The insulating housing includes a from end 101 and a rear end 102 retained with each other by a locking mechanism. The front end 102 defines a mating cavity 11 through a front face thereof The unitary rear end 102 includes a middle portion 103 which has a same dimension with and locks with the front portion 101 , and a rear portion 104 or retained portion with a larger dimension than the middle portion 103 . The rear portion 104 defines a plurality of grooves 12 petitioned by rib walls and opening upwards, which is provided for connecting cables, i.e. a cable-location portion.

Combination with FIG. 3 , the terminals 20 arranged in two-row pattern are formed by inserted mold with the insulating housing 10 . Each terminal includes a contacting portion 21 extending in the mating cavity 11 , a retaining portion 22 extending rearwards from the contacting portion and a terminal portion 23 extending rearwards from the retaining portion. The terminal portions 23 are received in first grooves 12 a one by one and a second or free groove 12 a at the left outermost of the lower row is free without any terminal portions of the terminals. The second groove 12 b is provided for a grounding wire 53 of a cable 50 , which will be described hereinafter. Other terminal portions overlap the wires of cables which do not shown in FIG. 3

A connecting bar 40 is embedded in the insulative housing 10 , which includes a main portion 41 located behind the terminal portions 23 , a first touching portion 42 and a second touch portion 43 forwards extending and bending from opposite ends of the main portion 41 . The first touching portion 42 overlaps a terminal portion 24 b of one terminal located at the second outermost of the lower row of terminals while the second touching portion 43 extend into the first groove 12 a to connect with said grounding wire 53 . Therefore, an electrical connection between said grounding wire and said one terminal portion 24 b are established by said connecting bar. The first touching portion is permanently connecting with the terminal portion 24 b by soldering or other method. The connecting bar 4 is alternatively formed with other conductive elements such as a copper foil, a metal wire, etc.

In HDMI Specification, a D-shaped HDMI connector includes nineteen conductive terminals P 1 ˜P 19 . A receptacle or board connector is loaded with these nineteen terminals in two rows in an interface thereof. Odd-number terminals P 1 , P 3 . . . P 19 are located at the upper row and even -number terminals P 2 , P 4 . . . P 18 are located at the lower row. A cable end plug or connector mating with the receptacle also has nineteen terminals in such array and a plurality of cables 50 connects with the terminals of the mating plug. The P 3 , P 5 terminals (in FIG. 3 , numerals 1 - 19 are labeled to show P 1 -P 29 terminals) on the upper lower of the terminals are configured as a differential pair and P 4 corresponds to said differential pair on the lower row is configured as a grounding signal, said three terminals are disposed in an inverted triangle pattern. The P 6 , P 8 , P 7 are also configured in a triangle pattern. The P 9 , P 11 , P 10 are configured in an inverted triangle pattern. The P 12 , P 14 , P 13 are also configured in an inverted triangle pattern. That is, the nineteen terminals include four first groups (P 3 - 5 , P 6 - 8 , P 9 - 11 , P 12 - 14 ) each comprising a pair of differential signal terminals and a grounding signal terminal. Please notes the P 1 , P 2 are discrete signal terminal and P 16 is a discrete grounding terminal, that is to say which three terminals do not configured as a triangle differential signal pattern. The two discrete signal terminals P 1 , P 2 and one discrete grounding terminal P 16 are disposed at opposite sides of said four first groups. In this embodiment of a HDMI D type cable end connector, the terminals 25 a , 24 a is functioned as P 1 , P 2 and the terminal 24 b is functioned as P 16 . Generally, at least five cables 50 connect with the terminals, each cable includes two signal wires 51 , 52 and a grounding wire 53 . In FIG. 3 , only one cable is shown, the other cables are same to the shown cable 50 and omitted. The signal wires of the cables connect with said four differential pair signal terminals and the grounding wires of the cables connects with corresponding grounding signal terminals, respectively (not shown in FIG. 3 ). When the signal wires 51 , 52 , of one cable (shown in FIG. 3 ) connects with P 1 , P 2 , the grounding wire 53 of this one cable should connect with the terminals 24 b since there is no corresponding grounding terminal and it is clearly shown that the grounding wire 53 will extend a larger distance to connect with the grounding terminal 24 b if without the connecting bar 40 . The connecting bar 40 electrically extends the terminal 24 b to a position adjacent to terminals 24 a , 24 b , so that the grounding wire 53 will not detour. Moreover, the grounding wire 53 is located near to the signal wires 51 , 52 to ensure a good anti-cross-talk.

The shielding shell 30 is construed with two portions surrounding the housing and locking with each other. The spring arm 31 s are retained in the cutouts 13 defined in the rear portion 104 . The front portion of the shell surrounds the front ends 101 to shielding the contacting portions of the terminals in the mating cavity and the rear portion of the shell surrounds the wires and the connecting portions of the terminals. A ring is formed in the shell to be provided for the cables 50 .

However, the disclosure is illustrative only, changes may be made in detail, especially in matter of shape, size, and arrangement of parts within the principles of the invention.