Terminal block

A terminal block comprising:

• a housing having a pair of generally parallel side walls, each of said side walls having a lower forward corner;
• a connector panel with forward and rearward surfaces rotatably mounted between said side walls about an axis perpendicular to said side walls, said connector panel including a plurality of connector elements providing connection portions on both its forward and rearward surfaces and being rotatably moveable between a first position in which access to the connection portions on the forward surface of said panel is provided and a second position in which access to the connection portions on the rearward surface of said panel is provided;
• first means for releasably retaining said connector panel in its first position;
• second means for releasably retaining said connector panel in its second position;
• and
• a front door having an inside and an outside surface pivotally secured to said housing near the lower, forward corner of said side walls by a wire hinge member comprising a pair of ends lying on a common axis for pivotally securing said front door to said housing and an intermediate section integrally joined with said pair of ends and extending over a portion of the inside surface of said front door, said intermediate section including means for retaining a connector designation card.

A terminal block comprising:

• a housing having a pair of generally parallel side walls, each of said side walls having a lower forward corner;
• a connector panel with forward and rearward surfaces rotatably mounted between said side walls and about an axis perpendicular to said side walls, said connector panel including a plurality of connector elements providing connection portions on both its forward and rearward surfaces and being rotatably moveable between a first position in which access to the connection portions on the forward surface of said panel is provided and a second position in which access to the connection portions on the rearward surface of said panel is provided;
• first means for releasably retaining said connector panel in its first position;
• second means for releasably retaining said connector panel in its second position;
• a front door having an inside and an outside surface pivotally secured to said housing near the lower, forward corner of said side walls;
• and
• a connector chassis immovably mounted to said housing between said side walls, said connector chassis including a plurality of multicontact connectors mounted in side-by-side relationship with adjacent multicontact connectors being offset with respect to one another to provide maximum multicontact connector density, said multicontact connectors being in addition to said plurality of connector elements included on said connector panel.