Circuit Breaker Operatio

 The primary functon of an electrical circuit breaker is to provide ipeoiog

and clisiog the curreot carryiog ciotacts.
 Circuit breaker remains at its closed positon for maximum period of its
life span.
 Very occasionally it is required to operate a circuit breaker for opening and
closing its contacts.
 Hence, circuit breaker iperatio must be very reliable without any delay
or sluggishness.
 Circuit breaker iperatog characteristc
Clisiog Operatio
Let’s at tme, T0 current starts fowing through the closing coil. Afer tme T1 the moving contact
starts traveling towards fxed contact. At tme T2 moving contact touches fxed contact. At tme
T3 the moving contact reaches at its close positon. T3 - T2 is overloading period of these two
contacts (moving and fxed contact). Afer tme T3 the moving contact bounce back litle bit and
then again comes to its fxed closed positon, afer tme T4.
 Circuit breaker iperatog characteristc
Trippiog Operatio
Let’s at tme T5 current starts fowing through trip coil of the circuit breaker. At tme T6 moving
contact starts traveling backward for opening the contacts. Afer tme T7, the moving contact
fnally detaches the fxed contact. Time (T7 - T6) is over lapping period. Now at tme T8 the
moving contact comes back to its fnal open positon but here it will not be at rest positon
since there will be some mechanical oscillaton of moving contact before coming to its fnal rest
positon. At tme T9 the moving contact fnally comes to its rest positon.
 Operatog Priociple
During normal operatng conditon the C.B. can be opened and closed by a staton operator
for the purpose of switching and maintenance.

Whenever a fault occurs on any part of the power system, the trip coil of the breaker get
energized and the moving contacts are pulled apart by some mechanism.

During opening of current carrying contacts in a circuit breaker the medium in between
opening contacts become highly ionized through which the interruptng current gets low
resistve path and contnues to fow through this path even the contacts are physically
separated.

During the fowing of current from one contact to other the path becomes so heated that
it glows. This is called arc.

Thus the current is able to contnue untl the discharge ceases. The producton of arc not
only delays the current interrupton and also generates enormous heat which may cause
damage to the system or to the breaker itself.
 Operatog Priociple
Therefore, the main problem in a circuit breaker is to extnguish the arc within shortest
possible tme.

The basic constructon of C.B. requires the separaton of contacts in an insulatng fuid.
 Fuoctios if iosulatog fuii
It serves two functons which are as follows

 Extnguishes the arc drawn between the contacts when the circuit breaker
opens.
 Provides insulaton between the contacts and from each contact to earth.
Commonly used insulatng fuids are
 Air at atmospheric pressure
High dielectric strength
 Compressed air Noninfammability
 Oil producing hydrogen for arc extncton High thermal strength
Arc extnguishing ability
 Ultra high vacuum Chemical stability
 Sulphur hexafuoride Commercial availability at moderate cost
 Methiis if Arc Ioterruptio ir Extoctio
There are two methods by which interrupton is done.

High resistaoce methii
In this method the efectve resistance between the contacts increases with tme
so that the current is reduced such a value that the heat produced by it is not
sufcient to maintain the arc and thus the current is interrupted or arc is
extnguished. The arc resistance can be increased by various methods like
lengthening, cooling, reducing cross secton and splitng of the arc. Applied in dc
power circuit breaker, low and medium ac power circuit breaker

Liw resistaoce ir curreot zeri ioterruptio methii
This method is applicable for ac circuits. In this method arc resistance is kept low
untl the current is zero where the arc extnguishes naturally . There are two
theories which explains the phenomenon of arc extncton:
1.Energy balance theory 2.Voltage race theory
Before going in details about these theories, we should know the
following terms.

•Restriking voltage: It may be defned as the voltage that appears

across the breaking contact at the instant of arc extncton.

•Recovery voltage : It may be defned as the voltage that appears

across the breaker contact afer the complete removal of transient
oscillatons and fnal extncton of arc has resulted in all the poles.

•Actve recovery voltage : It may be defned as the instantaneous

recovery voltage at the instant of arc extncton.

• Arc voltage : It may be defned as the voltage that appears across

the contact during the arcing period, when the current fow is
maintained in the form of an arc. It assumes low value except for
the point at which the voltage rise rapidly to a peak value and
current reaches to zero.
Eoergy Balaoce ir cassie Theiry: When the contact of circuit breaker are about to open,
restriking voltage is zero, hence generated heat would be zero and when the contacts are
fully open there is infnite resistance this again make no producton of heat. We can
conclude from this that the maximum generated heat is lying between these two cases
and can be approximated, now this theory is based on the fact that the rate of generaton
of heat between the contacts of circuit breaker is lower than the rate at which heat
between the contact is dissipated. Thus if it is possible to remove the generated heat by
cooling, lengthening and splitng the arc at a high rate the generaton, arc can be
extnguished.
Viltage Race ir recivery rate ir slepiao’s Theiry : The arc is due to the ionisaton of the
gap between the contact of the circuit breaker. Thus the resistance at the inital stage is
very small i.e. when the contact are closed and as the contact separates the resistance
starts increasing. If we remove ions at the inital stage either by recombining them into
neutral molecules or insertng insulaton at a rate faster than the rate of ionisaton, the arc
can be interrupted. The ionisaton at zero current depends on the voltage known as
restrikiog viltage.
Arc Ciotril Oil Circuit Breakers
(i) Self-blast oil circuit breakers—in which arc control is
provided by internal means i.e. the arc itself is employed for
its own extncton efciently.

(ii) Forced-blast oil circuit breakers— in which arc control is

provided by mechanical means external to the circuit
breaker.
Self-blast oil circuit breakers.
In this type of circuit breaker, the gases produced during
arcing are confned to a small volume by the use of an
insulatng rigid pressure chamber or pot surrounding the
contacts.
Since the space available for the arc gases is restricted by
the chamber, a very high pressure is developed to force the
oil and gas through or around the arc to extnguish it.
(a) Plain explosion pot.
• It is a rigid cylinder of insulatng material and encloses the fxed
and moving contacts.
• The moving contact is a cylindrical rod passing through a
restricted opening (called throat) at the botom.
• When a fault occurs, the contacts get separated and an arc is
struck between them.
 The principal limitaton of this type of pot is that it cannot be used for

very low or for very high fault currents.

 With low fault currents, the pressure developed is small, thereby

increasing the arcing tme.

 On the other hand, with high fault currents, the gas is produced so rapidly

that explosion pot is liable to burst due to high pressure.

 For this reason, plain explosion pot operates well on moderate short-

circuit currents only where the rate of gas evoluton is moderate.

(b) Cross jet explosion pot:
1- This type of pot is just a modifcaton
of plain explosion pot.
2- It is made of insulatng material and has
channels on one side which act as
arc spliters.
3- The arc spliters help in increasing the arc
length, thus facilitatng arc extncton.

When a fault occurs, the moving contact of the circuit breaker begins to separate. As the
moving contact is withdrawn, the arc is initally struck in the top of the pot. The gas
generated by the arc exerts pressure on the oil in the back passage. When the moving
contact uncovers the arc spliter ducts, fresh oil is forced *across the arc path. The arc is,
therefore, driven sideways into the “arc spliters” which increase the arc length, causing
arc extncton.
The cross-jet explosion pot is quite efcient for interruptng heavy fault currents.
However, for low fault currents, the gas pressure is small and consequently the
pot does not give a satsfactory operaton.
(c) Self-compensated explosion pot.
This type of pot is essentally a combinaton of plain
explosion pot and cross jet explosion pot. Therefore, it can
interrupt low as well as heavy short circuit currents with
reasonable accuracy.
(ii) Forced-blast oil circuit breakers.
• In a forced -blast oil circuit breaker, oil pressure is created by
the piston-cylinder arrangement.
• The movement of the piston is mechanically coupled to the
moving contact. When a fault occurs, the contacts get
separated by the protectve system and an arc is struck
between the contacts. The piston forces a jet of oil towards
the contact gap to extnguish the arc.
• It may be noted that necessary oil pressure produced does
not in any way depend upon the fault current to be broken.
Advantages
(a) Since oil pressure developed is independent of the fault
current to be interrupted, the performance at low currents is
more consistent than with self-blast oil circuit breakers.
(b) The quantty of oil required is reduced considerably.
 Low Oil Circuit Breakers
In the bulk oil circuit breakers, the oil serves as both arcs extinguishing
medium and main insulation. The minimum oil circuit breakers were
developed to reduce the oil volume only to amount needed for
extinguishing the arc - about 10% of bulk oil amount. The arc control for
the minimum oil breakers is based on the same principle as the arc control
devices of the bulk oil breakers. To improve breaker performance, oil is
injected into the arc.

In MOCB, The current interruption takes place inside "interrupter". The

enclosure of the interrupter is made of insulating material, like porcelain.
Hence, the clearance between the line and the enclosure can be reduced
and lesser quantity of oil would be required for internal insulation.

Arc extinction device is fitted to the upper fixed contact. The lower fixed
contact is ring shaped. The moving contact makes a sliding contact with the
lower fixed contacts. A resin bounded fiber glass cylinder encloses the
contact assembly. This cylinder is also filled with oil. Porcelain cylinder
encloses the fiber glass cylinder. Other provisions are similar to the bulk oil 1 vent valve 6 separating piston
circuit breaker. 2 terminal pad 7 terminal pad
3 oil level indicator 8 upper drain valve
4 moving contact 9 lower drain valve
5 lower fixed contact
• It has been found that only a
small percentage of oil is actually
used for arc extncton while the
major part is utlised for
insulaton purposes.
• For this reason, the quantty of
oil in bulk oil circuit breakers
reaches a very high fgure as the
system voltage increases. This not
only increases the expenses, tank
size and weight of the breaker
but it also increases the fre risk
and maintenance problems.
Advantages.
A low oil circuit breaker has the following advantages over a bulk oil circuit
breaker:
(i) It requires lesser quantty of oil.
(ii) It requires smaller space.
(iii) There is reduced risk of fre.
(iv) Maintenance problems are reduced.
Disadvantages
A low oil circuit breaker has the following disadvantages as compared to a
bulk oil circuit breaker :
(i) Due to smaller quantty of oil, the degree of carbonisaton is increased.
(ii) There is a difculty of removing the gases from the contact space in tme.
(iii) The dielectric strength of the oil deteriorates rapidly due to high degree
of carbonisaton.
 Air Circuit Breaker aoi Air Blast Circuit Breaker
This type of circuit breakers, is those kind of circuit breaker which operates in air at
atmospheric pressure. Afer development of oil circuit breaker, the medium voltage air
circuit breaker (ACB) is replaced completely by oil circuit breaker in diferent countries.
But in countries like France and Italy, ACBs are stll preferable choice up to voltage 15 KV.
It is also good choice to avoid the risk of oil fre, in case of oil circuit breaker. In America
ACBs were exclusively used for the system up to 15 KV untl the development of new
vacuum and SF6 circuit breakers.
The working principle of this breaker is rather diferent from those in any other types of
circuit breakers. The main aim of all kind of circuit breaker is to prevent the
reestablishment of arcing afer current zero by creatng a situaton where in the contact
gap will withstand the system recovery voltage. The air circuit breaker does the same but
in diferent manner. For interruptng arc it creates an arc voltage in excess of the supply
voltage. Arc voltage is defned as the minimum voltage required maintaining the arc. This
circuit breaker increases the arc voltage by mainly three diferent ways,

1. It may increase the arc voltage by cooling the arc plasma. As the temperature of arc
plasma is decreased, the mobility of the partcle in arc plasma is reduced, hence more
voltage gradient is required to maintain the arc.
2. It may increase the arc voltage by lengthening the arc path. As the length of arc path is
increased, the resistance of the path is increased, and hence to maintain the same arc
current more voltage is required to be applied across the arc path. That means arc
voltage is increased.
3. Splitng up the arc into a number of series arcs also increases the arc voltage.
 Types if ACB
There are mainly two types of ACB are available.
1. Air circuit breaker.
2. Air blast Circuit Breaker.

Types of Air circuit breaker

1. Plain break type air break circuit breaker
2. Magnetc blow-out type air break circuit breaker
3. Arc-chute air break circuit breaker
1. Plaio break type air break circuit breaker
It is the simplest one in which contacts are made in
the shape of two horns. The air initally strikes across
the shortest distance between the horns and is then
driven steadily upwards by the convecton currents
caused by heatng of air during arcing and the
interacton of magnetc and electric felds. The arc
extends from one tp to the other when the horns are
fully separated resultng in lengthening cooling of arc.
The relatve slowness of the process and the
possibility of arc spreading to adjacent metal work
limits the applicaton to about 500 V and to low
power circuit.
2. Magoetc Bliw-iut type air break circuit breaker
In a number of air circuit breakers employed in circuits
up to 11kV the arc extncton is accomplished by
means of magnetc feld provided by current in blow-
out coils connected in series with the circuit being
interrupted. Such coils are called blow-out coils,
because they assist in the arc being magnetcally
blown-out. The magnetc feld itself doesnot
extnguish the arc. It simply moves the arc into arc
chutes where the arc is lengthened, cooled and
extnguished. The arc shields prevent arc spreading to
adjacent metalwork.
 Operatio if arc chute ACB
 The frst objectve is usually achieved by forcing the arc into contact with as large an area as possible of
insulatng material. Every air circuit breaker is fted with a chamber surrounding the contact. This
chamber is called 'arc chute'. The arc is driven into it. If inside of the arc chute is suitably shaped, and if
the arc can be made conform to the shape, the arc chute wall will help to achieve cooling. This type of arc
chute should be made from some kind of refractory material. High temperature plastcs reinforced with
glass fber and ceramics are preferable materials for making arc chute.
 The second objectve that is lengthening the arc path, is achieved concurrently with fst objectve. If the
inner walls of the arc chute is shaped in such a way that the arc is not only forced into close proximity with
it but also driven into a serpentne channel projected on the arc chute wall. The lengthening of the arc
path increases the arc resistance.
 The third technique is achieved by using metal arc sliter inside the arc chute. The main arc chute is
divided into numbers of small compartments by using metallic separaton plates. These metallic
separaton plates are actually the arc spliters and each of the small compartments behaves as individual
mini arc chute. In this system the inital arc is split into a number of series arcs, each of which will have its
won mini arc chute. So each of the split arcs has its won cooling and lengthening efect due to its won mini
arc chute and hence individual split arc voltage becomes high. These collectvely, make the over all arc
voltage, much higher than the system voltage.
These breakers normally have two pairs of contacts. The main
pair of contacts carries the current at normal load and these
contacts are made of copper. The additonal pair is the arcing
contact and is made of carbon. When circuit breaker is being
opened, the main contacts open frst and during opening of
main contacts the arcing contacts are stll in touch with each
other. As the current gets, a parallel low resistve path through
the arcing contact during opening of main contacts, there will
not be any arcing in the main contact. The arcing is only
initated when fnally the arcing contacts are separated. The
each of the arc contacts is fted with an arc runner which
helps, the arc discharge to move upward due to both thermal Although this type of circuit
and electromagnetc efects as shown in the fgure. As the arc breakers have become
is driven upward it enters in the arc chute, consistng of obsolete for medium voltage
spliters. The arc in chute will become colder, lengthen and applicaton, but they are stll
split hence arc voltage becomes much larger than system preferable choice for high
voltage at the tme of iperatio if air circuit breaker, and current ratng in low voltage
therefore the arc is quenched fnally during the current zero. applicaton.
Air Blast Circuit Breaker
These types if air circuit breaker were used for the system voltage of 245 KV, 420 KV and even more,
especially where faster breaker operaton was required. Air blast circuit breaker has some specifc
advantages over oil circuit breaker which are listed as follows,
1. There is no chance of fre hazard caused by oil.
2. The breaking speed of circuit breaker is much higher during iperatio if air blast circuit breaker.
3. Arc quenching is much faster during iperatio if air blast circuit breaker.
4. The duraton of arc is same for all values of small as well as high currents interruptons.
5. As the duraton of arc is smaller, so lesser amount of heat realized from arc to current carrying contacts
hence the service life of the contacts becomes longer.
6. The stability of the system can be well maintained as it depends on the speed of operaton of circuit
breaker.
7. Requires much less maintenance compared to oil circuit breaker.
There are also some disadvantages of air blast circuit breakers
8. In order to have frequent operatons, it is necessary to have sufciently high capacity air compressor.
9. Frequent maintenance of compressor, associated air pipes and automatc control equipments is also
required.
10.Due to high speed current interrupton there is always a chance of high rate of rise of re-striking
voltage and current chopping.
11.There also a chance of air pressure leakage from air pipes junctons.
ABC are sub divided further into three diferent categories.
1. Axial Blast ACB.
2. Axial Blast ACB with side moving contact.
3. Cross Blast ACB.
In axial blast ACB the moving contact is in contact
with fxed contact with the help of a spring
pressure as shown in the fgure. There is a nozzle
orifce in the fxed contact which is blocked by tp
of the moving contact at normal closed conditon
of the breaker. When fault occurs, the high
pressure air is introduced into the arcing chamber.
The air pressure will counter the spring pressure
and deforms the spring hence the moving contact
is withdrawn from the fxed contact and nozzle
hole becomes open. At the same tme the high
pressure air starts fowing along the arc through
the fxed contact nozzle orifce. This axial fow of
air along the arc through the nozzle orifce will
make the arc lengthen and colder hence arc
voltage become much higher than system voltage
that means system voltage is insufcient to sustain
the arc consequently the arc is quenched
Axial Blast ACB with Siie Miviog Ciotact

In this type of axial blast air circuit breaker

the moving contact is fted over a piston
supported over a spring. In order to open the
circuit breaker the air is admited into the
arcing chamber when pressure reaches to a
predetermined value, it presses down the
moving contact; an arc is drawn between the
fxed and moving contacts. The air blast
immediately transfers the arc to the arcing
electrode and is consequently quenched by
the axial fow of air.
The working principle of cross blast air
circuit breaker is quite simple. In this system of air
blast circuit breaker the blast pipe is fxed in
perpendicular to the movement of moving contact
in the arcing chamber and on the opposite side of
the arcing chamber one exhaust chamber is also
fted at the same alignment of blast pipe, so that
the air comes from blast pipe can straightly enter
into exhaust chamber through the contact gap of
the breaker. The exhaust chamber is spit with arc
spliters. When moving contact is withdrawn from
fxed contact, an arc is established in between the
contact, and at the same tme high pressure air
coming from blast pipe will pass through the
contact gap and will forcefully take the arc into
exhaust chamber where the arc is split with the
help of arc spliters and ultmately arc is quenched.
SF6 Circuit breakers
Types if SF6 Circuit Breaker
There are mainly three types of SF6 CB depending upon the voltage level of
applicaton-
1.Single interrupter SF6 CB applied for up to 245 KV(220 KV) system.
2.Two interrupter SF6 CB applied for up to 420 KV(400 KV) system.
3.Four interrupter SF6 CB applied for up to 800 KV(715 KV) system.
Working of SF6 Circuit Breaker
The working of SF6 CB of first generation was quite simple it is some extent similar to air blast circuit
breaker. Here SF6 gas was compressed and stored in a high pressure reservoir. During operation of
SF6 circuit breaker this highly compressed gas is released through the arc in breaker and collected
to relatively low pressure reservoir and then it pumped back to the high pressure reservoir for re
utilize.The working of SF6 circuit breaker is little bit different in modern time. Innovation of puffer
type design makes operation of SF6 CB much easier. In buffer type design, the arc energy is utilized
to develop pressure in the arcing chamber for arcquenching.

Here the breaker is filled with SF6 gas at rated pressure. There are two fixed contact fitted with a
specific contact gap. A sliding cylinder bridges these to fixed contacts. The cylinder can axially slide
upward and downward along the contacts. There is one stationary piston inside the cylinder which is
fixed with other stationary parts of the SF6 circuit breaker, in such a way that it can not change its
position during the movement of the cylinder. As the piston is fixed and cylinder is movable or sliding,
the internal volume of the cylinder changes when the cylinder slides.
During opening of the breaker the cylinder moves downwards
against position of the fixed piston hence the volume inside the
cylinder is reduced which produces compressed SF6 gas inside
the cylinder. The cylinder has numbers of side vents which were
blocked by upper fixed contact body during closed position. As the
cylinder move further downwards, these vent openings cross the
upper fixed contact, and become unblocked and then compressed
SF6 gas inside the cylinder will come out through this vents in high
speed towards the arc and passes through the axial hole of the
both fixed contacts. The arc is quenched during this flow of SF6
gas.
During closing of the circuit breaker, the sliding cylinder moves
upwards and as the position of piston remains at fixed height, the
volume of the cylinder increases which introduces low pressure
inside the cylinder compared to the surrounding. Due to this
pressure difference SF6 gas from surrounding will try to enter in
the cylinder. The higher pressure gas will come through the axial
hole of both fixed contact and enters into cylinder via vent and
during this flow; the gas will quench the arc.
The main aim of any circuit breaker is to quench arc during current zero crossing, by
establishing high dielectric strength in between the contacts so that reestablishment of arc
afer current zero becomes impossible. The dielectric strength of vacuum is eight tmes
greater than that of air and four tmes greater than that of SF6 gas. This high dielectric
strength makes it possible to quench a vacuum arc within very small contact gap. For short
contact gap, low contact mass and no compression of medium the drive energy required in
vacuum circuit breaker is minimum. When two face to face contact areas are just being
separated to each other, they do not be separated instantly, contact area on the contact
face is being reduced and ultmately comes to a point and then they are fnally de-touched.
Although this happens in a fracton of micro second but it is the fact. At this instant of de-
touching of contacts in a vacuum, the current through the contacts concentrated on that
last contact point on the contact surface and makes a hot spot. As it is vacuum, the metal on
the contact surface is easily vaporized due to that hot spot and create a conductng media
for arc path. Then the arc will be initated and contnued untl the next current zero.