For more than 65 years, the company has worked alongside manufacturers and suppliers around the globe, providing retaining rings, wave springs, and hose clamps that play a critical role in ensuring the performance, safety, and reliability of every vehicle.
EVs demand parts that can handle extreme, high-performance environments while meeting strict safety and durability standards. That’s where Rotor Clip comes in. Its products are designed to secure connections, manage movement, reducing weight and reduce vibrations—all essential factors in keeping EV systems running smoothly. As the EV market continues to grow, Rotorclip is committed to evolving with it, continuously improving its solutions to meet the expanding needs of the automotive industry.
EVs rely on electric drivetrains powered by rechargeable batteries to provide a cleaner alternative to traditional combustion engines. The key components of an EV, including the battery, electric motor, and power electronics, work together to deliver energy, manage power flow, and drive the wheels. Rotor Clip’s retaining rings, wave springs, and hose clamps play a crucial role in ensuring the smooth operation of these systems. Trusted by manufacturers worldwide, the company’s parts are designed to meet the highest standards for safety, reliability, and durability. Certified to IATF 16949, Rotorcrlip’s engineering, metallurgical, and quality assurance teams oversee every step of production.
Rotorclip manages every critical production step in-house, ensuring precise quality control, optimised processes, and continuous innovation. The team specialises in providing custom solutions tailored to EV applications. If one of Rotorclip’s 20,000+ standard parts doesn’t meet a customer’s specifications, the company’s engineers will collaborate with them, from prototype to production, offering modifications such as adjustments to section and thickness, diameters, load and rotational capacity and materials.
Rotor Clip Parts and Their Functions
Retaining Rings:
Rotor Clip is the only manufacturer of every style of retaining ring (tapered section/ circlips, constant section/ snap rings, spiral rings). These rings are available in global standards including Inch, DIN, ANSI metric, and JIS. Retaining rings offer a reliable and cost-effective alternative to cotter pins and bolts, with minimal surface preparation and reduced mass. Ideal for a range of thrust loads, the rings can prevent unwanted movement, secure assemblies, ensuring precise alignment and take-up endplay in a range of automotive applications.
Wave Springs:
Rotor Clip Wave Springs (multi-turn, single-turn, nested, round-wire, linear) are designed for applications where space is limited, but high load-bearing capacity is critical—making them ideal for EV systems. By generating force through bending rather than torsion, these springs save both axial and radial space compared to traditional coil springs, addressing complex automotive challenges while ensuring smooth operation, reduced wear, and extended vehicle lifespan. Smaller spring cavities reduce assembly sizes and offer the added benefit of weight savings, which is essential for improved performance.
If an application requires exceptional resistance to torsional loads and high acceleration, customers can ask about Rotorcrlip’s new patened InterShim wave spring.
Hose Clamps:
Rotor Clip Hose Clamps (constant tension band, wire) securely fasten hoses carrying fluids like coolant and battery coolant in EVs. Rotorclip’s self-compensating clamps expand and contract with temperature changes, eliminating the need for manual adjustments and preventing over- or under-tightening. Designed for efficient pneumatic and manual installation, they reduce assembly time, lower costs, and improve production efficiency—all while meeting standards like IATF 16949 certification.
From Design to Application
EV Motor: Internal Retaining rings/ Snap rings are used to retain shaft bearings in the motor housing. Multi-Turn wave springs are used to preload bearings and reduce high speed vibration.
Battery Packs: Push-On retaining rings are used to secure module to module connections between battery packs.
Cooling Fans: Patented flat end Single-Turn wave springs are being used to preload the fan bearings and extend bearing life.
Coolant Overflow Reservoir: Constant-tension band clamps are used to secure low pressure overflow hoses from the radiator to the overflow reservoir.
Quick Connects: Used in the high-pressure battery pack cooling system, the quick connect fittings utilise internal snap rings to retain a Single-Turn wave spring and a shim end Rotor Clip Multi-Turn wave spring in the internal quick connect and valve assemblies.
Rotor Clip parts also support the full range of e-mobility applications. From e-bikes and e-scooters to electric boats, aircraft, and the next generation of electric transportation, the company’s precision-engineered parts ensure safety and reliability in every part of your build. As industries shift toward greener, more sustainable solutions, Rotor Clip is committed to providing solutions that support today’s electrification efforts and tomorrow’s innovations.
BOX: Quick Connectors
But the benefits of Wave Springs and Retaining Rings extend beyond EVs, with both solutions being widely utilised in quick connectors and circular plug-in connectors, including those with threaded and bayonet locking mechanisms, across military, aerospace, and industrial sectors. Designers can choose from single-turn, nested, or multi-turn wave springs, as well as custom options to meet the specific demands of various connector applications, offering flexibility and performance for virtually any design need.
Single-Turn Wave Springs in Quick Connectors
Single-turn wave springs are the ideal choice for use in connectors, when precise loading is required. Whether needed to provide a preload or take up tolerances, this design allows the spring to cling to the bore, saving more radial space compared to a traditional stamped wave washer. The overlapping ends help prevent radial jamming by enabling circumferential movement, ensuring consistent load performance at the specified work height.
Overlapping ends positioned in the wave’s incline ensure smooth contact without scratching surfaces. The use of rolled wire with a radius edge prevents damage to the housing or shaft, as it avoids the burrs typically created during stamping. Using a coiling process prevents wasting material and maintains the metal’s grain structure, unlike stamping methods. This uninterrupted force line in the circumferential direction enhances dynamic strength and reduces the risk of breakage.
After connecting the male and female component of the quick connector, the wave spring maintains constant force at its work height, with minimal load tolerance. This ensures a secure, continuous connection with the precise force needed. For corrosion resistance, materials like stainless steel (e.g., AISI 316 for offshore applications) and exotic alloys can be utilised to meet the specific requirements
Multi-Turn Wave Springs in Quick Connectors
Multi-turn wave springs offer similar advantages to single-turn wave springs but have key differences that enhance their performance.
Unlike single-turn wave springs, multi-turn wave springs cannot cling to the bore. If the design of the multi-turn wave spring resulted in peripheral movement of the turns against each other, then this could cause problems. It could render the spring unstable because the local maxima of the waves will run out of their vertical line.
One major benefit of multi-turn wave springs is their increased travel and deflection capability. Because the overall deflection is distributed across each turn, each turn experiences less deflection than in a single turn design. Using multi-turn wave springs could result in a 50% reduction in axial space compared to traditional coil springs.
Similar loads with minimal tolerances are provided at various work heights, making it easy to adjust applications to meet specific requirements.
Two-Turn Spiral Retaining Rings & Snap Rings in Quick Connectors
Two-turn spiral retaining rings and snap rings with constant sections provide designers with enhanced flexibility to meet the specific requirements of unique applications.
Unlike traditional tapered rings, constant section rings lack lugs or lug holes, minimising the risk of interference with adjacent components such as cables or the male part of a quick connector.
The ID/OD-lock function can be designed to create a permanent assembly between the connector cap and inner component. Since these rings are coiled and not stamped, they do not have sharp edges or burrs that could scratch soft surfaces, such as plastic housings.
With a 360° closed surface of contact, two-turn spiral rings prevent soft materials, like rubber sealing elements, from being pushed through gaps. This design ensures that local maxima of a wave spring cannot shift into openings, maintaining the specified load at work height.
Using AISI 316 stainless steel, Inconel, or Elgiloy, as a standard material for these rings ensures excellent corrosion resistance, making these rings ideal for offshore applications and the chemical industry.
Nested Wave Springs in Quick Connectors
Certain quick connectors demand higher forces to ensure secure connections, often due to safety regulations established by government standards or military and aerospace guidelines. When it comes to load limitations, single-turn wave springs are restricted by the wire sizes available for specific diameters. For applications requiring greater load capacity, nested wave springs are an excellent alternative.
A nested wave spring offers a higher load capacity than both single-turn wave springs and stamped wave washers, all while occupying the same radial space as a single-turn design. This compact design requires less radial space than a disc spring, which can also deliver higher loads, while providing significantly greater travel compared to a single disc spring.
Additionally, using a nested wave spring simplifies the assembly process. Unlike single-turn designs, stamped parts, or disc springs that require stacking, a nested wave spring consolidates functionality into a single component, making assembly more efficient and straightforward.
