Condition monitoring of vacuum circuit breakers using vibration analysis

Vibration analysis is a potential effective method for condition monitoring of circuit breakers (CBs). In this paper, a time-frequency method using an algorithm of wavelet packet is applied in the subsequent analysis for vibration signals. The vibration signal collected on the framework of vacuum circuit breaker by an acceleration sensor is decomposed into individual frequency bands and those bands that contain the main signal energy are extracted to form individual condition eigenvector. All eigenvectors derived from various conditions are used for Condition classification of CBs. Based on this monitoring method, asynchronous feature between three poles have been simulated in a 35kV vacuum circuit breaker and difference between vibration signals during close operation with no-load and that with short-circuit current is investigated, which verify the feasibility and accuracy of the vibration analysis in condition monitoring of vacuum circuit breakers.