TC-1: Technical Committee on Electrical Contacts, Connectors, and Cable
The scope of this Committee is to be the focal point within the IEEE CPMT Society for electrical contacts, electrical connectors, and interconnecting cable. Its membership consists of individuals having an interest in the research, development, manufacture, and utilization of electrical contacts and devices which contain them. The Committee holds regularly scheduled meetings and functions through the Holm Organization and through task forces having specific objectives. The Committee sponsors or supports conferences, publications, educational, standardization, and other activities.
The 1999 IEEE Holm Conference on Electrical Contacts was held in Pittsburgh in October. The was the 45th Annual conference in the United States where professionals presented and discussed the latest developments in the field of electric contacts. This year, we had 120 attendees including 34 from overseas. The technical program was very successful with 31 papers and 2 tutorials. Papers were presented on electric contacts in switches, relays and connectors, new contact materials and coatings, arc fundamentals, thermal models, finite element analysis and corrosion.
Two special tutorials were also presented: first one by Professor Werner Rieder on Low Voltage Switching, and the second one by Professor Mehran Mehregany and Dr. Daniel Hyman on Microelectromechanical Systems (MEMS) and its applications in electrical contacts. The conference also sponsored an evening social with a visit to the Pittsburgh Regional History Center. TC-1 also held its annual membership meeting during the conference.
The 2000 IEEE Holm Conference will be held in Chicago, September 25-27.
The committee also sponsors a 3 to 4 day intensive course on electrical contacts annually. The course has been very successful in teaching engineers the physics and practice of contact designs and selections. The course is a favorite for switch, relay, circuit breaker, contactor, and connector engineers from automotive, power distribution and telecommunication fields.
For more information on many special events organized by this committee such as intensive course, international conference, CD-ROM library, please visit our web site at www.cpmt.org/tc/tc1.