RELATED APPLICATIONS

The present application claims priority to Chinese Patent Application No. 201910533343.7, filed on Jun. 19, 2019 and Chinese Patent Application No. 201910773566.0, filed Aug. 21, 2019, which said applications are incorporated by reference in their entirety herein.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This disclosure relates to serial connection of two electrical cables, in particular, to a serially-connectable device for electrical cables.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

A light string includes a plurality of light sources directly soldered onto the power wire at intervals, so as to form a string-shaped illumination device without a lamp holder, as known in the art. To small-sized light sources, such as small bulbs, light emitting diodes, light string are a common arrangement of the light sources. A light string is as flexible as the power wire is, such that the string light is easily arranged in any configuration to comply with requirements for special illumination or decoration.

Generally, a length of a light string is fixed. If it is required to elongate the length of the light string, light strings have to be soldered together according to the circuit design of the light string. The soldering process is difficult to perform on a light string with thin power wires, and soldering defects usually occur.

SUMMARY

In view of the above problems, this disclosure provides a serially-connectable device to solve the above-mentioned problem.

This disclosure provides a serially-connectable device, including a plug, an electrical cable, and a fixing, latching, attaching or joining sleeve. The plug includes an insert portion and a plurality of apertures, and the apertures are arranged in parallel to each other and formed through the insert portion. The electrical cable includes a plurality of metal wires. Tips of the metal wires respectively run through the apertures and are folded back onto a surface of the insert portion to form a plurality of pins or conductive terminal portions. In an embodiment, the joining sleeve is a hollow structure with two insert holes formed on two ends of the joining sleeve. A plurality of electrical conductors are disposed within the joining sleeve, each of the electrical conductors extends from one of the two insert holes to the other insert hole, and the insert portion is inserted into one of the two insert holes, to have the wire conductive portions or “pins” respectively contact the electrical conductors in the sleeve.

In at least one embodiment of this disclosure, each of the metal wires is wrapped by an electrical insulation layer, and the electrical insulation layer on the tip of each of the metal wires is removed.

In at least one embodiment of this disclosure, the plug includes a latch member, the fixing sleeve includes at least one latch hole corresponding to the latch member, and the latch member is engaged into the latch hole.

In at least one embodiment of this disclosure, the joining sleeve includes an upper case body and a lower case body separable from each other.

In at least one embodiment of this disclosure, a plurality of clamping grooves are arranged in the joining sleeve, the clamping grooves are on the lower case body, each of the clamping grooves extends from one of the two insert holes to the other insert hole, and the electrical conductors are metal strips respectively fixed in the clamping grooves.

In at least one embodiment of this disclosure, each of the electrical conductors is a sheet metal spring with two ends being elastic deformable, the electrical conductors are fixed to the fixing sleeve in parallel to each other, and in an embodiment, each of the electrical conductors extends from one of the two insert holes to the other insert hole.

In at least one embodiment of this disclosure, the fixing sleeve further includes a circuit board, the electrical conductors are printed wires or conductors on the circuit board, and the printed conductors extend from one end to the other end of the circuit board in parallel to each other; the circuit board is fixed in the fixing sleeve to have two ends of the circuit board be arranged corresponding to the two insert holes.

In at least one embodiment of this disclosure, the fixing sleeve system further comprises at least one electronic component disposed within the fixing sleeve and connected to at least one of the electrical conductors.

Through the serially-connectable device of this disclosure, electrical cables can be quickly connected in series without a soldering process. In particular the serially-connectable device of this disclosure can be utilized to connect light strings, so as to quickly elongate the length of a light string. Through the combination of the fixing sleeve and the plug, mechanical and electrical connections between two electrical cables are achieved, and the fixing sleeve further provides protection by wrapping, so as to accomplish purposes of electrical insulation and waterproof.

