Environmental temperature and humidity are one of the key factors affecting the service life of electronic connectors. Environmental factors can affect the reliability of connectors through a series of chemical reactions, leading to contact failure and insulation failure, thereby shortening the service life of connectors and increasing the frequency of equipment failures.
Environmental temperature and humidity can easily cause contact failure of connectors. The contacts of connectors are usually made of copper metal, which undergoes an oxidation reaction at ambient temperature to form an oxide film. As the ambient temperature increases, the rate of oxidation reaction accelerates and the oxide film layer gradually thickens. Due to the poor conductivity of the oxide film layer, its thickening can increase the contact resistance of the contact body, thereby affecting the conductivity performance of the connector. When the contact resistance increases to a certain extent, the connector will experience contact failure, affecting the normal operation of the equipment.
Environmental temperature and humidity can also cause insulation failure of connectors. The insulator of the connector is mainly made of high molecular weight polymers and other materials. Under the action of temperature stress, the movement of molecules inside these materials will accelerate, and vacancies are easily generated on the molecular chains. At this point, harmful gases and other media in the air will penetrate and diffuse into the interior of the material. Under the influence of environmental temperature, polymer materials undergo thermal degradation and cross-linking reactions, leading to material degradation. Deteriorated materials will experience a decrease in both physical and electrical properties, thereby affecting the insulation performance of insulators. When the insulation performance decreases to a certain extent, the connector will experience insulation failure, resulting in a decrease or failure of the electrical performance of the equipment.
Therefore, in order to maintain the long-term reliability of connectors, connector manufacturers must fully consider the impact of environmental temperature and humidity on connectors during the design and production process. When selecting contact materials and insulation materials, materials with good oxidation resistance and thermal degradation resistance should be chosen. Meanwhile, effective measures should be taken in the processing technology to reduce the degradation rate of materials under environmental temperature stress and improve the environmental resistance of connectors. Through these measures, the service life of the connector can be effectively extended and the reliability of the equipment can be improved.
