Principles of Circuit Breakers

By
D M. Karkare

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
 Current Zero Interruption Theories

The recovery rate theory ( Slepian’s theory)

 The energy balance theory( Cassie’s theory)

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
 Recovery Rate Theory

The rate at which the gap recovers its dielectric

strength, is compared with the rate at which
restriking voltage across the contacts rises.
If the re-striking voltage rises more rapidly
than the dielectric strength, the space breaks
down and the arc persists.

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
 Energy Balance Theory
 Immediately after the current zero, the contact space contains
ionized gas and therefore has a finite post-zero resistance.

 The rising restriking voltage causes a current to flow between the

contacts so that power is dissipated in the contact space.

 Initially when the restriking voltage is zero, the power is zero and it
is again zero when the space has become fully de-ionized and the
resistance is infinitely high; between these two limits the power
dissipated rises to maximum.

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
 Contd….
 If the heat so generated exceeds the rate at which heat can be
dissipated from the contact space; ionization will persist and
breakdown will occur, giving an arc for another half cycle.

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
Contd….
 A rapid increase of dielectric strength or post-zero resistance is necessary
for successful interruption and this can be achieved by:
Lengthening of the arc
Cooling
Blast Effect.

Dielectric strength or post-zero resistance is proportional to the length of the

gap so that lengthening by rapid opening of the contacts is obvious
procedure.
Natural combination of ions and electrons takes place more rapidly if they are
allowed to cool.
Cool non-ionized gas or liquid can be forced into the contact space thereby
cooling the ions and electrons and sweeping them away.

These methods are applied in oil and air-blast breakers.

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
 Recovery Voltage
 The normal frequency r.m.s voltage that appears
across the breaker poles after final arc extinction has
occurred, is termed as the recovery voltage.

 The instantaneous value of the recovery voltage at the

instant of arc extinction is called is called the active
recovery voltage.

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
Contd….
The active recovery voltage depends on the following
factors:

 The power factor

 The armature reaction

 The circuit conditions.

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
Effect of Power Factor on recovery voltage

 With low p.f, i.e when the ratio of reactance to resistance of

the circuit is high, the active recovery voltage will be high.
 With High p.f, i.e when the resistance is high as compared to
the reactance, the active recovery voltage would be
considerably lower.
In general the active recovery voltage equals the maximum
value of the system voltage multiplied by sin , where  is
power factor angle.

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
 Effect of armature reaction on recovery voltage

 The recovery voltage is less than the normal system

voltage because of demagnetizing effect of armature
reaction.

 The fault currents flowing in the generator windings

are of lagging power factor.

 They have demagnetizing armature reaction. Hence

they reduce the terminal voltage
BMS Evening College of Engineering,
3/27/2010
Bangalore
 Effect of circuit conditions on recovery voltage

Three phase faults that are insulated from

earth, either at neutral or at fault, produce
recovery voltages in the first phase to clear
which are normally more severe than those
produced by single-phase or three phase faults
on systems with earthed neutrals,
BMS Evening College of Engineering,
3/27/2010
Bangalore
 Restriking Voltage
• The transient voltage that appears across the contacts
at the instant of arc extinction is called the re-striking
voltage.

BMS Evening College of Engineering,

3/27/2010
Bangalore
 BMS Evening College of Engineering,
3/27/2010
Bangalore