In air blast circuit breakers, compressed air at a pressure of around 20-30 kg/cm² is employed as an arc quenching medium. Airblast circuit breakers are suitable for operating voltage of 132kV ad above. So here this article gives the main key advantages and disadvantages of air blast circuit breaker to better understand this topic.
Advantages of air blast circuit breaker:
- It is risk-free from fire.
- It requires less maintenance.
- Small in size.
- Arc quenching is much faster.
- The time duration of the arc is the same for all values of the current.
- They are suitable for frequent operations.
- It is used where frequent operation is required just because of lesser arc energy.
- The basic speed of the circuit breaker is too much higher.
- Cheapest and free availability of the interrupting medium, chemically stale and inertness of air.
- The fire hazard is eliminated like in the oil circuit breakers.
- Facility for high-speed re-closure.
- Short ad consistent arcing time ad, therefore, less during of contact.
Disadvantages of Air blast circuit breaker:
- It requires additional maintenance.
- The air has relatively lower arc extinguishing properties.
- An air compressor plate has to be installed and maintained.
- From the air pipe junction side, there may be a chance of the problem of air pressure leakage.
- There is the chance of a high rate rise of re-striking current and also problem of voltage chopping.
- It contains a high capacity air compressor.
- In the air blast circuit, a current chopping problem exists.
- This air blast circuit breaker produces a high level of noise when air is discharged to the open atmosphere.
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