Electrical cable harness fabrication

In a harness fabricator of the type including a termination station whereat insulated multiconductor cable is terminated to a multi-circuit connector, means for feeding multiconductor cable to said termination station, means for supplying connectors to said termination station, means for applying a connector to a cable at the termination station, means for cutting the cable adjacent the connector, means for ejecting the terminated and cut cable harness from the termination station, and harness testing means for testing the electrical integrity of the cable harness, the improvement in the harness testing means comprising:

• said cutting means being adjustable to cut said cable at a point spaced from the connector to form an intermediate harness product having a test tab including segments of the cable conductors extending beyond the connector;
• stripping means for baring the insulation from at least a portion of the test tab to expose a portion of the conductor segments;
• a cable tab probe for electrically engaging adjacent conductors of the cut and stripped tab to test the electrical integrity of cable harness test tab;
• and means for trimming the tab after testing, whereby a harness fabricator including simultaneous production and quality control testing capability is provided.

A harness testing arrangement comprising:

• an intermediate harness product including a multiconductor cable segment said cable having parallel spaced-apart insulated conductors and at least one multi-circuit electrical connector terminated to said cable segment, said intermediate harness product further including a test tab including segments of the cable conductors extending beyond said connector;
• and
• a harness tester assembly comprising
• a frame assembly;
• an elongate delivery track extending substantially the length of said frame from a harness receiving end to a final unloading end including harness advancing means for conveying said intermediate cable harness product along the delivery track;
• an array of work stations operatively connected to the frame assembly disposed along the delivery track, the array of work stations including;
• a harness receiving station disposed adjacent said harness receiving end including means for gripping the intermediate harness product adjacent said connector opposite the test tab and means for introducing the gripped harness product into engagement with the advancing means in said delivery track;
• a conductor stripping station including means for temporarily stopping the advancing intermediate harness product at the stripping station for a time sufficient to permit conductor stripping menas to strip a portion of the insulation from the conductors of the test tab, said stripping means including control means for releasing said temporary stop means after completing the stripping step to release the stripped intermediate harness product for continued advancement in the delivery track;
• a harness testing station including electrical testing means including a plurality of spaced test probes disposed above the delivery track and adapted to wipingly engage barred segments of adjacent conductors of the test tab for electrical testing of adjacent circuits within the intermediate harness product as it moves through the testing station, said electrical testing means including means for generating an output signal indicative of a defective harness product;
• a test tab trimming station including a temporary stop means for retaining the harness product in the trimming station, blade means for cutting the test tab from the connector and trimming control means adapted to receive and interpret output signals from the testing station, said control means being effective to prevent the blade means from cutting the test tab for those intermediate harnesses identified as defective by the output signal from the testing station;
• and means for electrically releasing the temporary stop means to permit the resulting harness to advance from the trimming station to said final unloading end, whereby, the presence of a test tab on a harness at the final unloading end of the delivery track provides a tready visual indication of a defective cable harness.