The effect of current on stationary contact behaviour

Author

Bennett, B.W.

Author_Institution

Bell Commun. Res., Red Bank, NJ, USA

fYear

1988

fDate

26-29 Sept. 1988

Firstpage

267

Lastpage

276

Abstract

A general time-dependent model has been developed that is based on electromigration and describes the effect of current on stationary electrical contacts, as used in telecommunication circuits. Model predictions were found to be in excellent agreement with experimental results obtained from gold and copper contacts. Based on these results it is proposed that sealing current, which is a 5-30-mA DC continuous current applied to splices to maintain their integrity, works by establishing a steady state between contact growth due to electromigration and contact degradation due to oxidation and/or corrosion.<>

Keywords

cable jointing; corrosion protection; electrical contacts; electromigration; maintenance engineering; oxidation; reliability; telecommunication cables; 5 to 30 mA; Au-Au contacts; Cu-Cu contacts; DC continuous current; contact degradation due to oxidation; contact growth due to electromigration; contact reliability; effect of current; electromigration; experimental results; model predictions; sealing current; splices; stationary contact behaviour; telecommunication circuits; time-dependent model; Circuits; Contacts; Copper; Corrosion; Degradation; Electromigration; Gold; Oxidation; Predictive models; Steady-state;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Electrical Contacts, 1988., Proceedings of the Thirty Fourth Meeting of the IEEE Holm Conference on

Conference_Location

San Francisco, CA, USA

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/HOLM.1988.16128

Filename

16128