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Design and Building a High Voltage Switchgear Safety System

Conference Paper · July 2020

DOI: 10.1109/ICCSP48568.2020.9182459

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 Design and Building A High Voltage
Switchgear Safety System
Prashobh Karunakaran, Member IEEE, Mohammad Shahril Osman, V. Karuppanna, Sung Chee
Cheng, Lee Man Djun, Alexon John and Ting Kwong Hieng
Abstract—High Voltage (HV) switching is dangerous and there
have been many fatalities among switching personnel. It is
therefore imperative that HV switching be performed from a safe
distance away from the switchgear. Motors with lead screws
seem to be the standard solution for actuation today but after
much deliberation of the practicality, the solution formulated is
an electro-pneumatic one. The high voltage Switchgear Safety
System developed in this research is focused on the Lucy brand
of 11kV switchgears which is the most common in Sarawak,
Malaysia but can easily be modified to operate other brands of
switchgears. This is because the basic idea is to have a high force
actuation happening at a safe distance away. User-friendliness of
operation, maintenance as well as weight considerations were the
prime criteria used in the design. The system was successfully
tested on a high voltage switchgear.
Index Terms— accidents, arc-quenching, electro-pneumatic,
high-voltage, remotely control, switchgear safety switching,
substations
I. INTRODUCTION
D ESPITE most actuation moving towards motor control
with lead screws today, after much research and study, it
was determined that electro-pneumatics is the best option to
build this high voltage (HV) Switchgear Safety System. This
is especially so upon making the main criteria user-
friendliness and ease of maintenance. Many high voltage
(HV) switching are done in rural settings where transportation
of the switching system over long distances in a car can result
in exposure to heat and vibrations on bad roads which can
damage a VFD (variable frequency drive) controlled motor to
pull or push the switchgear lever. It must be noted that just as
a laptop cannot withstand heat, vibration and dust, a VFD is
Prashobh Karunakaran is a Senior Lecture in electrical engineering at
University College of Technology (UCTS), Sibu, Sarawak, Malaysia (Phone:
60128879578, e-mail: prashobh.karunakaran@gmail.com).
Mohammad Shahril Osman is a Professor of mechanical engineering
UCTS (drshahril@ucts.edu.my).
V. Karuppanna is a PhD student at UCTS (vayaloorank@gmail.com).
Sung Chee Cheng is a Masters student at UCTS (davidsung@klt.edu.my).
Lee Man Djun is a lecture in mechanical engineering lecturer at UCTS
(man.djun@ucts.edu.my
Alexon John is a degree student at UCTS (benlex12@gmail.com).
Ting Kwong Hieng is a degree student at UCTS (jacktinghieng@outlook.com
basically a computer which should be treated the same. Also,
in rural locations where many substations are located, there is
inaccessibility of spare parts to repair a VFD or electronic
based system. A system using a motor without VFD was tried
by the local electric authority (LEA) and it did not have
enough force to perform the switching [1]. If a more powerful
motor is used, it might break the switchgear handle.
Therefore, an expensive VFD is necessary to precisely control
the force exerted by an induction motor. Comparatively a
simple tuning screw shown in “Fig. 1” can vary the air
pressure going into a pneumatic cylinder and therefore the
force exerted by it.
Switching of HV switchgears have caused many fatalities
or serious injuries. IGBT (insulated gate bipolar transistors)
switchgears have been recently developed and will potentially
solve the HV switching hazards of the future [1], but in the
meantime, a system must be designed to enable switching
personnel (SP) to be far away from HV switchgears when
switching it. The HV switching system designed in this
research will eliminate the chances of injury to SP because
they can be up to 25m away, in their car while triggering the
HV Switchgear Safety System.
33kV and above switchgears or circuit breakers (CB) are
typically switched remotely from a control center (dispatch
center), but 11kV switchgears are normally manually
switched. Investigations into the root causes of HV
switchgear accidents have indicated that most are due to SP
not following the operation checklist diligently but there are
cases where totally abnormal or unpredictable events have
caused the accidents [2]. So, it is imperative that the SP be
away from the switchgear as it is being switched.
Among the accident cases, four SPs in Kuala Lumpur (KL),
Malaysia were switching a 11kV switchgear and all died when
the switchgear exploded upon switching. Investigations
showed that the previous SP jumped the fuse for the
switchgear. [2].
Another accident was a SP observing that the oil level in an
oil circuit breaker (OCB) was low but assumed it was
sufficient, he switched the breaker off and it exploded causing
the SP to receive second degree burns [2]. This accident
occurred because the length of the arc between the HV
contacts was shorter and thicker than the it should be. So, it is
critical that the arc be exactly the right length and thinness.
A third accident was a SP who tried to observe the SF6 level
in a 11kV breaker but the glass covering the gauge was
blurred so he switched it anyway resulting in an explosion but
luckily, he was not injured [2]. It was discovered that the SF6
leaked out. This SF6 breaker is made by Siemens which is a
172-year-old electric company with the second largest revenue
among electrical component making companies. If a SF6 can
leak from switchgear from such a company, it is a reasonable
assumption that it will leak from any brand of SF6
switchgears. Keeping SF6 in a leak proof tank is possible but
there is always an actuation shaft which moves through an O-
ring to enable the electrical breaking. It is through this O-ring
that SF6 leaks out as the O-ring becomes defective [3,4].
The fourth accident can be found as the words, “Switchgear
explosion - YouTube” is typed in Google. This Youtube
video is shown by most electrical engineering lecturers to their
students. It is a security camera footage of two SPs raking in a
HV VCB (vacuum circuit breaker). The three L1, L2, L3
VCBs are in a metal compartment with four wheels below it.
As this unit is racked in, three VCBs are placed in between
three HV live contacts (L1, L2, L3) at the bottom to the three
HV load contacts at the top. But if the wheels of this
compartment are not properly sitting on rails below it, a phase
to phase short can occur which is what happened in this
footage, killing one of the SP.
It should be mentioned here that all ions are conductors of
electricity and the standard electrical breaking system from a
good quality MCB (miniature circuit breaker) in homes all the
way the largest electrical breaker, is that some insulator
material is blown in between the contacts such that the arc
formed upon breaking the contacts is as long and thin as
possible. Short and thin arcs can be powerful and can cause
explosions as second case study above showed. On the other
side of the contacts where the arcs are blown into are many
parallel plate structures with edges facing the arc. These
edges split the arc and prevent it from being continuous and
dangerous; these are called arc splitters. The problem with oil
circuit breakers (OCB) which used to be the main HV
switchgears previously, is that oil can be ionized and all ions
or plasma of metals elements or compounds all the way to
insulator are conductors. The standard way to convert an atom
or neutral compound to an ion is by passing them through a
powerful arc. This is exactly what occurs in switchgears as
they are switched on or off. The reverse process of changing
ions back to atoms is by cooling which happens as the fast
flow of the oil or gas is blown over the arc. Therefore, in an
OCB as the insulating oil is blown across the arc, it will
eventually become ions and therefore a conductor. If these
conductive ions are blown in between the contacts, an
explosion will result, probably injuring the SP [5]. To
overcome this, the procedure followed by electric utilities is to
open a nut at the bottom of the OCB and drain a little of the
insulating oil and test its dielectric strength. The previous SP
not performing this activity is one of the causes of OCB
explosion despite following all the check-list procedures.
Many electric utilities follow a span of time like six months
before testing the insulating oil. But the proper procedure
should be the number of times the OCB is switched since the
ionization of the oil is directly proportional to the number of
times the switchgear is switched.
It is due to such problems of OCBs that the electric industry
has moved to SF6 breakers because it is very hard to separate
the F from the S in SF6 compared to insulating oil. SF6 is not
harmful to humans since it is a stable compound which is hard
to ionize. Ions are dangerous for humans as well as electrical
systems because they form conductive paths. But because of
these strong bonds, it is 22,800 times more dangerous than
CO2 as a global warming gas, having an atmospheric lifetime
of 800-3200 years compared to 20-200 years for CO2 [6].
Another difference between HV CB and the home MCB is
that they have an extra arching contacts made of tungsten.
Tungsten has the highest melting point among all elements
discovered so far, at 3422 °C. The tungsten arching contacts
are made sharper and are closer to each other than the main
contacts which are made of copper plated with silver. Electric
current will always choose a sharper contact to travel through
which is why electrical personnel should never wear metals on
their bodies; sharp points of gold rings have been known to
take off electric personnel’s fingers. This author was working
in the local electric utility (LEA) and was tasked to investigate
the case of a 11-year old boy who climbed up a 11kV tower.
He took three days to die. Upon visiting him at the hospital,
every sharp point of his body was missing or burnt off (finger,
toes, nose ears and genital). He could talk and was
continuously calling out for his mom, who apparently ran
away from home; he probably committed suicide. So, all
arcing passes through the arcing contacts and only then the
main contacts touch each other. All main contacts from good
quality MCBs of homes or factories to the largest HV CBs
have the main contacts made of copper plated with silver.
II. LITERATURE REVIEW
It should be noted that breaking a HV switchgear is about
2.5 times more dangerous than closing it. Table 1. depicts the
typical ratings of a 11kV switchgear. The rated interrupting
current is 26.5-43kA while the rated making or closing current
is 69kA.
Therefore, breaking is 2.5 times more dangerous than closing
this HV CB. The earliest HV switchgear were knife switches
mounted on asbestos frames but as voltages increased these
became too dangerous. Today HV CBs needs complicated
mechanical engineering designs and material technology
knowledge and are therefore quite highly priced [7]. The cost
of HV CBs increases as the voltage increases due to the
increasing quality of materials and mechanical engineering
needed to quench bigger arcs [8]. Another problem in HV CB
are tiny leaks of rain water or moisture into the insulating oil
tanks which reduces its dielectric strength.
The latest development in HV CB was done by a consortium
at N.C. State University. This can potentially eliminate HV
CB accidents and fatalities because the HV switching is done
with IGBT or silicon carbide SiC MOSFET based switchgears
[9]. These HV transistors switch in 1070ns compared to 0.1s
for OCB.
 Therefore, these solid-state switchgears can switch 100,000
times faster than an OCB. At such high speed of switching,
all the mostly mechanical engineering arc-quenching
mechanisms need not be used. Once this becomes
commonplace, switching accidents and fatalities will be a
thing of the past. The design at N.C. State University includes
a small transformer following the logic of SMPS (switch mode
power supply).
Table 1: Typical specification of a HV switchgear
Table 1: Typical specification of a HV switchgear
Type 11kV Indoor VCB
Isolation Type Vertical/ Horizontal
Rated Voltage 3.7 - 12.3kV
Continuous Current 400 - 1595A
Rated interrupting current 26.5-43 kA
Rated Making Current ≤ 69 kA
Rated Short Time Current ≤ 27 kA for 4 s
Busbar Current Rating ≤ 2300A
A SMPS rectifies the incoming 50-60 Hz AC waves into DC
then creates AC of more than 100kHz; as the frequency
increases, the transformer decreases in size plus ensures a
flatter DC. This DC is then inverted back to 50/60 Hz AC.
With such a system, today’s 1 MVA transformer which
weights seven tons and has dimensions of about 9’ X 9’ X 7’
is reduced in size to a 2’ X 1’ X 1.3’ frame. Note 2’ is less
than a stretched-out arm length, so the requirement for a land
area for a switchyard will also disappear, and the whole HV
incoming Ring Main Unit (RMU) can be placed on a pole [9].
III. DESIGN AND TESTING
The HV Switchgear Safety System designed and built in
this research focuses on the Lucy Electric brand 11kV
switchgear which is a U.K. brand commonly used in Sarawak,
Malaysia. But the final system developed can be easily
modified to be used for other brands of switchgears, including
raking in of 33kV HV VCB units.
After a long deliberation and experimentations, the design
was to use an electro-pneumatic system. It must be noted that
the Lucy brand 11kV switchgear requires a strong person’s
force to switch it.
An electro-pneumatic circuit was designed and built
consisting of a contactor, an electro-pneumatic valve, Start &
Stop switches, a pneumatic pump, a 24V power supply and a
screw tunable air pressure controller. The initial thinking was
to use a heavy base to hold down the pneumatic cylinder but
this option was foregone because a SP will not be willing to
carry such a heavy thing to the switchyard.
Fig. 1: Tuning screw to vary force of the pneumatic cylinder.
So, a ratchet rope will be swung round HV switchgear’s
body to hold down the wooden base of the pneumatic cylinder.
Initially a light load capacity ratchet rope was purchased but it
broke while pulling the 11kV Lucy CB at the LEA. This
indicates the high force to pull CB handle. Then the highest
strength ratchet rope was purchased.
The full circuit designed to get this system to work is shown
in “Fig. 2”. Initially as the Start button is pressed, an AC
240V will provide energy to magnetize the solenoid in the
contactor which will pull down the contacts to close the 24V
circuit via the NO contact sending 24V DC from the power
supply to the electro-pneumatic valve, specifically the
solenoid in this valve. This will magnetize it, pulling the shaft
depicted in “Fig. 3” to the other end. As the shaft is at the left,
60psi of pumped air is allowed to move into an entrance hole
and exit other holes. As the shaft moves to the right, the
entrance hole previously opened is blocked and exit holes
previously blocked is now open. A solenoid moves the shaft
to the right and it returns to the left via a spring when the
solenoid is deenergized. In both actuation of extending and
retracting the pneumatic cylinder shaft, the compressed air at
the other side of the piston is released via an exhaust hole of
the electro-pneumatic valve.
Fig. 2: Electro-pneumatic circuit diagram.
Fig. 3: Typical shaft inside the electrop-neumatic valve.
The next thing needed is a base to hold the pneumatic
cylinder and the solution to this shown in “Fig. 4”. The base
must be built such that the pneumatic cylinder has a maximum
degree of freedom to allow for human variation in exactly
where the wooden base is fastened onto the bottom of the HV
CB with a ratchet strap. The ratchet strap will be used to hold
down the wooden portion below the pneumatic cylinder to the
body of the HV CB. The wooden base is made of five layers
of plywood. It is not smoothened because friction is needed
for it to hang onto the HV CB’s body while the ratchet strap
holds it down and actuation of the pneumatic cylinder
happens. And the pneumatic cylinder will be actuated from
the SP’s car. Two pumps are used in this design, the 2.5HP
one is the yellow one in “Fig. 6” bottom and the smaller
0.25HP one is shown in “Fig. 8”, right middle is 0.25HP.
In “Fig. 8”, the left-most socket point will switch on the
small 0.25 HP pump and if this does not have enough force to
pull the switchgear lever, the 2.5HP pump plug will need to be
inserted to the top most socket point. Then the pressurized air
fitting (quick-connect fitting) will also need to be swapped to
enable using the bigger pump. The 2.5 HP pump can generate
7 atm of air pressure while the 0.25 HP pump can generate
2.05 atm.
After successfully pulling the HV CB as shown in an initial
test at the LEA, the next step was to build an easily carried
wooden box to carry the whole system in the back seat of a
car. A 3000-watt inverter was purchased to run the system
from within a car. The next step was to build an extra-long
jumper cable. The ones sold in the market cannot be used
because they are too short. The jumper cable in this design
must be connected to the car battery terminals, located in the
front of the car and the system in the wooden box located in
the back seat of the car. But upon powering up, the 3000-watt
inverter could not power up the 1865 watts (2.5HP) pump.
The sound made by the pump indicated it was trying to turn
but did not have sufficient power. After going through much
literature, it was discovered that for non-surging devices like a
laptop, the inverter should be specified to have a rating of 50%
above the marked rating meaning a 100W laptop should be
powered by a 200W inverter. But for surging equipment like
motors where currents can shoot up during starting, it is
recommended to use an inverter of 200 to 300% of the motor
rating [10]. Therefore, to run a 1865 (2.5 HP) pneumatic
pump, the rating must be 5595 watts.
Therefore, to run larger loads the only way was to purchase
a larger inverter. The larger inverter shown in “Fig. 5” (black
box on the road) was purchased. This inverter was made by
Wagan and is rated at 10,000W with surge capability of
20,000W. This inverter must be connected to the car battery
with a jumper cable. But upon connecting the pump to the
inverter, it ran continually and but not continuously. It is
however enough to build up pressure in the pump as long as
an air-off valve of “Fig. 5” bottom right is installed at the
outgoing pipe of the pump. But it was not a total
disappointment because the inverter can run the 0.25HP pump
and therefore the whole system as long as this amount of force
is sufficient to pull the switchgear handle. This experiment
proved that inverters do not perform as advertised. This
inverter was purchased from the USA therefore its output is
120V. In “Fig 5” top right is an autotransformer used to step
up the voltage from 120V to 240V to power the 2.5HP pump.
The autotran was designed and contracted out to be fabricated
by a transformer factory for MYR380≈USD92. It can convert
voltages to or from 120V, 240V or 220V and has a current
carrying capacity of 20A. Though autotrans are well known
in industry, there are apparently many who do not know their
advantages especially cost-wise. There was a big American
factory in Kuching, Malaysia named Sanmina which ran all
their American voltage (120V) requiring machines with
standard, two coil 240V:120V step down transformers costing
USD3,600 each. Those transformers had dimensions of 2’ X
1’ X 1’ and weighted close to 50kg. But none of those factory
machines needed more than 15A of current to run. An extra
tap of 220V was made because Malaysia is close to China and
has lots of Chinese machines and therefore the need for a
Chinese voltage supply.
After noticing that the 2.5HP pump can only be run slowly
with the inverter, a 2kW (PF=1.0, 240V) genset was
purchased to provide the required 240V. This genset is shown
in “Fig. 6” below the wooden box. With this genset, the
whole system and the pump ran continuously with full power.
In “Fig. 7”, left, all the socket points are joined in parallel
therefore plugging a plug from the genset to any of the four
socket points will energize all the socket points and therefore
the whole system. The finalized system is shown in “Fig. 6”.
It takes two trolleys to move the whole system to a SP’s car
which is normally a pickup truck. “Fig. 7” and “Fig. 8” are
the components in the top and lower components of the
wooden box respectively. The wooden box must be placed in
the back seat of a car and the yellow 2.5HP air pump can be
placed between the front seat and the back seat. That is the
most appropriate place for it to prevent it from tipping it over.
If this pump is tipped over, lubricating oil will leak out.
Because the genset is outgassing and will even have residual
smell after operation, the best vehicle is a pickup or double
cab truck (basically a small truck where four people can sit).
This is optimum because there is a separation between the
humans and the cargo bed.
“Fig. 9” is the final testing done at the university HV lab
with a 11kV Lucy brand switchgear donated by the LEA. As
shown in the picture, the yellow ratchet rope needs to be at
different positions to achieve switching on and switching off.
During the initial test, the link between the pneumatic cylinder
and the switchgear handle was a 4mm2 electric cable which
eventually came loose despite a double knot tie. Therefore,
this was replaced with a multi-strand flexible steel rope shown
in “Fig. 4” bottom. This multi-strand flexible steel rope is tied
in between the blue Al cylinder (which came with the
pneumatic cylinder) and the washer and nut below it. A
ratchet socket wrench of size #13 (the typical type used by
mechanics) is determined to be the best wrench to lock the
wire rope fastener (shown in “Fig. 4” bottom) at the site; this
is activity takes the longest time in the process of performing
the switching operation. A big combination plier to hold the
wire nut fastener to make the final tight spanner turn of the nut
will be helpful. At least 1” length of rope must be provided
between the blue cylinder and the hole in the switchgear
handle, to increase the degree of freedom for this actuation.
Fig.4: The SP will carry the above pneumatic cylinder
together with a ratchet strap to the HV switchgear

Fig 5: On left is the testing of the 2.5HP pump powered by the
10,000W inverter. On the right top is a 20A capacity autotran.
Fig. 6: The final system in an easily carried wooden box. Two
trolleys must be used to move the whole system to a car. On
one trolley is the wooden box with the electro-pneumatic
system and the genset below it. The other trolley is to carry
the pneumatic pump plus the inverter.
Fig. 7: The non-circuitry parts are placed in the top
compartment of the wooden box.
Fig. 8: The finalized circuitry located in the bottom
compartment of the wooden box.
Fig. 9: The final successful test on the 11kV switchgear.
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