Electrical terminal for bladed fuse

Claim 1

An electrical connector for connecting an automotive fuse to another circuit member, said automotive fuse being of the type including an elongate dielectric fuse housing having a body portion with an edge and a pair of coplanarly aligned, spaced-apart, flat metallic contact blades extending from said edge, said electrical connector comprising: a dielectric connector housing including a front end with at least one elongate opening and an opposed rear end with at least one pair of spaced and aligned openings, a fuse-receiving slot extending rearwardly from said elongate opening in the front end to a rear slot surface disposed intermediate the front end and the rear end of the housing, and at least one pair of spaced-apart terminal receiving cavities extending forwardly from said pair of rear end openings to said rear slot surface and communicating with said fuse-receiving slot; and at least one pair of terminals stamped and formed from a unitary metal strip having a substantially uniform thickness, each terminal including first and second spaced apart bases and a pair of adjacent spaced apart U-shaped contact structures extending between and interconnecting the first and second bases and defining a blade-receiving contact slot therebetween, each said U-shaped contact structure including a first contact arm extending from said first base and a second contact arm extending from said second base and a connecting strip extending therebetween, said first contact arms and said second contact arms each being spaced apart a distance substantially larger than said strip thickness and having a generally convex arcuate contact edge portion extending into said blade-receiving contact slot such that the distance between opposing arcuate edge portions of said U-shaped contact structures is less than the thickness of a said flat contact blade of an automotive fuse, each terminal being mounted in one of said terminal-receiving cavities so that the blade-receiving contact slot is aligned with the fuse-receiving slot and the bases are disposed adjacent the rear end of the housing, each terminal further including a second contact portion extending from one of said bases for electrically engaging said another circuit member, whereby, insertion of an automotive fuse into said fuse-receiving slot so that the edge of the fuse housing generally abuts said rear slot surface and the flat blade contact portions are received in the blade receiving contact slots of the terminals causes the U-shaped contact structures of each terminal to be deflected away from one another generating four vibration-resistant points of electrical contact between each terminal and each fuse blade to securely, electrically and mechanically engage the automotive fuse in said connector.