Force Guided Relay | USA
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Figure 1. relays (forced guided relay and general-purpose relay)
Figure 1 shows the appearance of a force guided relay anda
general-purpose relay.
There are various types of relays, but the safety-related part of a
machine's control system (SRP/CS: Safety-Related Part of a
Control System) uses force guided relays. In addition to its
primary purpose of switching contacts, when it detects a welded
contact failure of its own contacts, the force guided relay is also
used for the purpose of maintaining a stop until a failure is
resolved,
Structure and Operation of
Force Guided Relays
The structure and operation of a force guided relay are shown in
Table 1.
In a force guided relay, the NO (normally open) and NC (normally
closed) contacts are separated by a wall and are insulated from
each other. The NO and NC contacts are mechanically connected
by a link mechanism (guide), and operate in conjunction with each
other depending on whether a voltage is supplied to the coil
The main feature of the force guide relay is that this link
mechanism (guide) keeps the NC contact open when the NO
contact is welded together and remains closed as shown in state 3
in Table 1 below.T eracmrni | Geaimsamatin
In Table 1, one NO contact and one NC contact are shown to
illustrate the principle of the force guided relay, but in actual
products, three NO contacts and one NC contact are generally
used as one set,
When actually using force guided relays, for example, KI and K2
shown in Figure 2, for each of the two force guided relays, three
NO contacts are connected to the power control circuit of
3-phase AC such as the machine motor, and one NC contact is
connected to the monitoring circuit (between $33 and $34 in
Figure 2)
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By doing so, the machine is stopped when voltage applied to the
coil is OFF as shown in state 1 in Table 1, and the machine is
running only when the NO contact is closed while voltage applied
to the coil is ON as shown in state 2 in Table 1. The use of NO
contacts in the power control circuit also has a feature of making
it easier to ensure safety because when the voltage applied to the
coil is OFF due to wire disconnection or other causes, the NO
contacts open, and the machine stops.
In this state, the NC contact is closed when the voltage applied to
the coil is OFF (when the machine is stopped) as shown in state 1
in Table 1, and the NC contact is open when the voltage applied to
the coil is ON as shown in state 2When a welded contact of the power control circuit occurs at the
NO contact of KI as shown in state 3 of Table 1, the NC contact of
K1 in the monitoring circuit, which operates in conjunction with the
guide, remains open even if the voltage to the coil is set to OFF. In
this state, K2 is operating normally, and so the machine can be
stopped by opening the three NO contacts of K2. By connecting
the NC contacts of KI and K2 in series to the monitoring circuit,
the machine cannot be started even if the start switch of $2 is
operated because the NC contacts remain open due to the effect
of the welded NO contact of KI. Therefore, in order to restart the
machine, the Ki force guided relay that is welded together must
be replaced with a normal one.
Thus, by using two force guided relays, the machine can be
stopped even if one of the NO contacts is welded together, and
restarting can be prevented for maintaining the safety of the
machine.
Other Failure Modes (Broken Plate
Spring)
In terms of safety, breakage of plate springs is one of the most
important failures that must be taken into account,
Figures 3 and 4 show the respective states of the force guided
relay and general-purpose relay when the plate spring is broken
In a force guided relay, the NO and NC contacts are separated by
a wall
Therefore, if the plate spring of one of the contacts breaks, it will
not affect the other contact, and the impact is minimized.
On the other hand, general-purpose relays have a C-contact that
integrates the NO and NC contacts. Therefore, a broken spring
can cause both contacts to conduct and impact a neighboring
system, which may cause the machine to start moving in an
unintended motion or make it impossible to stop the machine
when you try to stop it. For this reason, general-purpose relays
cannot be used in the safety-related part of the control system.
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