between the contacts building up at a rate thousands of times higher than that obtained with other

circuit breakers.

Construction:
Figure shows the parts of a typical
vacuum circuit breaker. It consists
of fixed contact, moving contact and
arc shield mounted inside a vacuum
chamber. The movable member is
connected to the control mechanism
by stainless steel bellows. This
enables the permanent sealing of the
vacuum chamber so as to eliminate
the possibility of leak. A glass
vessel or ceramic vessel is used as
the outer insulating body. The arc
shield prevents the deterioration of
the internal dielectric strength by
preventing metallic vapours falling
on the inside surface of the outer
insulating cover.

Operation:
When the breaker operates, the moving contact separates from the fixed contact and an arc is
struck between the contacts. The production of arc is due to the ionization of metal ions and
depends very much upon the material of contacts. However, the arc is quickly extinguished
because the metallic vapours, electrons and ions produced during arc rapidly condense on the
surfaces of the circuit breaker contacts, resulting in quick recovery of dielectric strength. Since
vacuum has very fast rate of recovery of dielectric strength, the arc extinction in a vacuum
breaker occurs with a short contact separation (say 0·625 cm).

Advantages:
(i) They are compact, reliable and have longer life. (ii) They can interrupt any fault current. The
outstanding feature of a VCB is that it can break any heavy fault current perfectly just before the
contacts reach the definite open position. (iii) VCB are ideally suited for capacitor
switching-restriking-free operation, reactor switching, transformer and capacitor bank switching.

Disadvantages:
The operating mechanism is spring-assisted ‘quick-make’
and ‘quick-break’ type with trip-free feature. The MCB has
long ‘arc runners’ with arc control device having 13
‘arc-splitters’.
When the overflow of current takes place through MCB –
Miniature Circuit Breaker, the bimetallic strip gets heated
and it deflects by bending. The deflection of the bi-metallic
strip releases a latch. The latch causes the MCB to turn off
by stopping the flow of the current in the circuit. This
process helps to safeguard the appliances or devices from
the hazards happening due to overload or overcurrent. To
restart the flow of current, MCB must be turned ON
manually.
In the case of short circuit conditions, the current rises
suddenly in an unpredictable way, leading to the
electromechanical displacement of the plunger associated with a solenoid. The plunger hits the
trip lever, it causes the automatic release of the latch mechanism by opening the circuit breaker
contacts.

Performance:
MCBs have inverse I-T characteristics in the overload range and instantaneous response in
short-circuit range (8-10 times the rated current). When MCB trips due to ‘overcurrent’, the knob
jumps to OFF position. MCB has short current interruption time of 15 to 20 milliseconds.
Ratings:
MCB’s ratings are assigned mainly for preferred ratings like 6 A, 10 A, 16 A, 20 A, 25 A, 32 A,
40 A, 50 A and 63 A. The normal current breaking capacity is 5 kA.
Application:
The MCB’s are most suitable for protection of lightning, fans, domestic air-conditioners etc.
Advantages:
(i) They are ‘factory-sealed’ unis and hence, completely tamper-proof. (ii) They offer more
definite protection than any fuse because MCB’s I-T characteristics are defined compared to the
others. (iii) They are equivalent to a switch-fuse combination thereby reducing the cost and panel
space.
*Working Principle*.

After disconnecting the contacts, the last point of current will be the contact surface
which results in high current density at these points and due to which resistive heating
occurs.

Due to excessive heating, the metal ions starts vaporising from the contact surface.

When these ions come in between of two contacts, then they provide a path to the current
and current starts flowing which we see as an arc. This is how arc generates in these
breakers.When this arcing current reaches its first zero (at half cycle) the dielectric strength
of the vacuum rapidly builds up and it interrupts the current at first half cycle. The arc will
not restrike because of very high insulating strength of vacuum.

After the current interruption at fist half cycle, the metallic ions will condense again on the
contact surface.

In this way, the arc and extinguishment and current interruption is done in a vacuum circuit
breaker.

Now, we will see the advantages, disadvantages and uses