Non-synchronous impact phenomena of closing operation in medium voltage vacuum circuit breakers

The impact phenomenon of vacuum interrupters is a basic event while closing a vacuum circuit breaker. It reveals lots of information including the maximum impact force applied on the vacuum circuit breaker. And this impact force might lead to a mechanical failure of vacuum interrupters, mechanical structures of VCB and etc. The objective of this paper is to investigate non-synchronous impact phenomena of medium voltage VCB during the closing operation. PVDF (polyvinyldene fluoride) piezoelectric sensors were used to measure impact forces of three phases vacuum interrupter in medium voltage vacuum circuit breakers. A multi-body dynamic analysis simulation model was set up to analysis the interaction of impact forces among three phases by using an ADAMS software. The experimental results showed that the peak impact force of a medium voltage was increased linearly with the closing energy of vacuum interrupters. And the simulation results also showed that the effect of contact gap variation on the impact forces of three phases in the medium voltage vacuum circuit breakers.