The wear of the coaxial connector has a great adverse effect on the performance of the RF connector, and the wear process removes the joint surface layer that provides corrosion protection for the touch material. The most common contact materials are copper alloys, all of which are very susceptible to rust in typical RF connector environments.

    There are two primary reasons for the wear of the RF coaxial connector. The most prominent case is that when the plug and socket contact surfaces slide and touch each other, wear occurs every time the bite is engaged. The second type is wear due to micro-motion during the life of the connector. Micro-motion is a small-scale motion caused by mechanical disturbance or thermal expansion mismatch, from a few microns to tens of microns.

     Take into account the performance of the connector. In applications where low contact force is acceptable/required, such as low current, high pin count low bite force and high endurance applications, the predicted wear mechanism is polishing wear and the wear rate will be low.

    Typically, power applications will require higher contact forces to account for higher demands on contact interfaces in terms of resistance and stability. In these cases, the adhesive and abrasive wear mechanisms may be more active. It is also one of the reasons why many power connection designs use several contact beams. This system reduces connector resistance because several beams are electrically paralleled and they can be designed to have lower contact forces to reduce the probability of adhesive and abrasive wear.

    In this case, the wear and tear problem requires the best solution in the design and manufacture of the connector system. Since the wear rate is inversely proportional to the hardness, the wear rate of the tin finished connector will be greater than that of the gold connector. This type of relationship also shows why the hard gold is used in general. In addition, the main parameter of the design that adversely affects the wear of the gold finished connector is the nickel base plate. The height of the finish affects the frequency of wear that the connector can withstand without the wear and tear. Some should consider thin gold or glitter gold. If the connector system is perceived to be deficient in wear performance, the contact lubricant will be sufficient to improve performance to meet application specifications. The design of the connector must take into account the wear and tear problem, otherwise the adverse effect on the performance of the connector will be fatal.