ALPS Electric Unveils Industry’s First Two-Circuit Sliding Contact Micro Switch
Micro switches work by means of internal contact snap action, a mechanism that uses a spring and operates when a certain amount of pressure is applied to it. They are commonly used in various applications such as automobile Electric Parking Brakes (EPB), that operation detection is required. In order to ensure their safety, they are accompanied by a duplex circuit fail-safe. Up to now, in case of EPB, two micro switches were used to provide redundancy. However, this method faces some issues, such as mismatch of timing of the ON/OFF synchronization in each switch during low speed operation. To overcome this issue, Alps developed two-circuit sliding contact micro switch, a “clip type” product, featuring a two-sided sliding contact structure that clips fixed contacts from both sides. Furthermore, the structure is resistance to particles, dust, vibration, and impact resulting in a reliable contact. Read more
