6 December 2020

Vacuum circuit breaker advantages and disadvantages

As we know in circuit breaker, the vacuum circuit breaker comprises a steel arc chamber in the center of symmetrically arranged ceramic insulators. So here this article gives the advantages and disadvantages of the vacuum circuit breaker to better understand this topic.

Advantages of vacuum circuit breaker:

  • The vacuum circuit breaker does not require any additional filling of the oil or gas. They do not need period refilling.
  • The inertia of the movable guide rod is small and can be used frequently.
  • breaker unit is compact and self-contained. It can be installed in any required orientations.
  • The small operating mechanism, and small size, light in weight.
  • The contact gap is very small, generally about 10 mm.
  • Service life is long.
  • Rapid recovery of high dielectric strength of current due to interruptions. That only a half cycle or less arcing occurs or after proper contact separation.
  • The control power is small, and the action noise is small during switch operations.
  • The arc extinguish time is short, the arc voltage is low, the arc energy is small, the contact loss is small, and the number of breaking time is large.
  • With multiple reclosing functions, suitable for the requirement of the application of a distribution network.
  • Above reasons together with the economic advantages offered, the vacuum circuit breaker has too much high acceptance.
  • The arc extinguishing medium or insulating medium does not use oil, there is no danger of living and explosion and it is safe.
  • Extinguish the arc is sealed container and the arc and hot gas are not exposed. As a separate component, the arc extinguishing chamber is simple and convenient to is all ad debug.
  • The contact head is divided into a completely sealed structure, and its performance will note reduced by the influence of moisture, dust, gases, etc. Reliable work, stale on-off performance.
  • After the arc is broken, the medium between the fractures recovers quickly and the medium does not need to e replaced.

Disadvantages of vacuum circuit breaker:

  • It needs an additional surge suppressor for the interruption of low magnetizing current in a certain range.
  • The requirement of high technology for the production of the vacuum interrupters.
  • Loss of vacuum due to transit damage or it is failure makes the entire interrupter useless and it cannot be repaired on-site.
  • When an inductive or capacitive load is disconnected, overvoltage is easily caused due to the interception process, and reignition, etc, and the corresponding overvoltage protection should be adopted.
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