Apparatus and method for manufacturing load plates used on socket connector

A method of forming a metal plate strip for loading upon the IC package on the printed circuit board PCB comprising:

• providing an insulative housing;
• providing a plurality of contacts in the insulative housing;
• providing a printed circuit board;
• providing a linking device mounted onto the printed circuit board and a back plate;
• arranging a plurality of metal plates in two opposite rows, each metal plate being of a U-shape with two opposite side arms and an opening between the side arms, the opening of the metal plate in one of the rows receiving two side arms of two adjacent metal plates in the other row;
• providing the metal plate with a tongue portion located on a front of the load plate and extending forwardly and two pivotal portions inwardly bent at free ends the side arms;
• loading one metal plate on the insulation housing;
• fastening the tongue portion by a hole;
• providing the linking device with two bolts and two slots;
• fastening the two orthogonal pivotal portions of each metal plate with corresponding slots of the linking device and top edges of the pivotal portions by heads of the two bolts.

An electrical connector assembly for mounting the IC package on the printed circuit board (PCB), comprising:

• an insulative rectangular housing having an upward receiving cavity in an upper face and defining a lengthwise direction and a transverse direction perpendicular to each other;
• a plurality of contacts disposed in the housing with contacting sections upwardly extending into the receiving cavity;
• and
• a printed circuit board;
• a linking device mounted onto the printed circuit board;
• a load plate positioned upon the housing and defining a U-shaped configuration in a top view;
• wherein said U-shaped configuration includes a pair of side arms each with thereof a maximum width along said transverse direction, and a space between said pair of side arms along said transverse direction is dimensioned at least two times of said maximum width so as to allow material corresponding to said space to be able to be formed as the side arms of other two load plates in a same row carrier during production of said load plate;
• the load plate has two orthogonal pivotal portions bent from a free end thereof and connected into corresponding slots defined on the linking device, and top edges of the pivotal portions restrained by heads of two bolts.