Supportable contact and chip carrier socket for use with an assembly/disassembly tool

An improved chip carrier socket for electrically connecting leads on a chip carrier to respective conductive areas of a circuit member wherein the leads are spaced apart and project from a peripheral edge of the chip carrier and are held in contact with their respective contacts within the chip carrier socket by a cover which is pressed into place, said chip carrier socket being adapted for so that the insertion related forces required to wedge said leads against said contact can be opposed so as not to act on the connection with the circuit member;

• said socket comprising:
• a housing having
• a chip carrier socket cavity;
• a plurality of contacts located around the perimeter of the cavity, said contacts having
• a resilient portion made of a contact arm and a back-up arm adapted to cooperate with the cover to urge the lead against said contact arm, said resilient portion being further adapted so that the insertion forces exerted on the arms, when the cover is being pressed into place, are balanced about the centerline of said resilient portion;
• a terminal portion adapted for electrical connection to the circuit member;
• a web connecting said resilient portion and said terminal portion;
• a tool receiving recess facing outward from the chip carrier socket cavity, said recess defined by an upwardly facing surface of the terminal portion, an outwardly facing surface of the web and a downwardly facing surface of the resilient portion, wherein said outwardly facing surface of the web is disposed inward along the downwardly facing surface beyond the point of intersection of the downwardly facing surface and a centerline of the resilient portion;
• an externally exposed side face in communication with the contacts;
• and
• a cover including a wedge for wedging each of the leads into pressing engagement with the resilient portion of the contact;
• whereby, during assembly, support is provided to the tool receiving recess so that when the cover is being pressed into place and the chip carrier leads are being wedged into pressing engagement with the resilient portion of the contact, the insertion forces normal to the chip carrier socket are opposed by a tool.

A method of assembling highdensity, flexible lead, integrated circuit chip carriers to surface mount chip carrier sockets having tuning fork shaped contacts, wherein each lead is electrically connected to a respective contact which in turn is electrically connected to a circuit member, whereby minimal assembly forces are exerted on the circuit member connection, the steps comprising:

• placing the chip carrier into the chip carrier socket cavity of the socket;
• orientating the leads of the chip carrier so that each lead is adjacent a respective contact;
• pressing a cover into engagement with the leads and into the tuning fork shaped contact, thereby wedging the lead and the cover within between a contact arm and a backup arm of a resilient portion of the contact;
• while simultaneously,
• opposing the pressing forces by engaging a tool receiving recess in the contacts located beneath the resilient portion of the contact.