By Valerie Coffey
Whitney Blake Company (Bellows Falls, VT), manufacturer of cables and cable assemblies, has announced that their straight cable, coiled cords, and high-performance flexible products may now be designed to meet the environmental requirements of the Restrictions on Hazardous Substances (RoHS) and Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) initiatives taking place in Europe, Japan, and California in 2005 and 2006.
Whitney Blake's custom cable, coiled cords, and cable assemblies for hand-sets, head-sets, medical diagnostics, and military communications applications can now be designed without lead, mercury, cadmium, or other materials, as specified in RoHS and WEEE. Focused engineering and design efforts resulted in products using environmentally compliant materials suitable for a variety of medical and commercial interconnect applications.
According to Paul Carter, Whitney Blake vice president of sales and marketing, cadmium and other heavy metals are prevalent in product designs developed for high-flex cabling. The alternate materials and technology used to replace cadmium and tin/lead are proprietary, says Carter, and Whitney Blake initiated action well ahead of competitors.
"A high percentage of our products are for applications that are in motion (retractile cords), so our technical challenge was to meet the high-flex requirements, suppleness, abrasion resistance, and cut-through resistance of the jacket," said Carter.
New product designs meet the high-performance application requirements and fully comply with the RoHS and WEEE requirements while maintaining their physical properties. Cable conductors range from a 30- to 10-AWG wire, are cabled to 30 conductors, and may be shielded or unshielded.
