Connectors and Vibrations – Damages in Different Electrical Environments

Sammanfattning: The assessment of failure mechanisms in electrical systems due to electrical connector in a vibrating media often relies on only one type of electrical environment, i.e. resistive load. However, these are not capable of digging out the behavior of connectors when the electrical system includes other electrical environments, for instance inductive load. The aim of the thesis is to fill this gap, by studying how the damages of electrical contacts in a vibrating environment depend on the electrical environments, in heavy vehicles. The purpose is to investigate, what effects current and voltage have in each electrical environment related to connector’s lifespan and reliability. The main failure mechanism in the connector with tin coated cable terminals are fretting corrosion which is induced by micro oscillatory motion due to vibration and thermal fluctuation. To do so a serie of experimental studies has been conducted for different samples of electrical connectors.