A novel post-arc current measuring equipment based on vacuum commutation and arc blow

The paper proposes a novel post-arc current measuring equipment (PACME), which is based on the vacuum arc commutation and the arc blow. The PACME is composed of vacuum circuit breaker (VCB), shunt resistor, protective gap, high-precision current sensor and applied transverse magnetic field (TMF). The construct and parameters of the PACME is designed. The vacuum arc commutation between the vacuum arc and the shunt resistor is investigated and the influence of the TMF arc blow on the vacuum arc commutation is discussed. The test platform is established in the synthetic short-circuit test. The high-speed CMOS camera is used to observe the development of the vacuum arc in the current commutating process. The protective characteristic of the PACME is test and the post arc current of the AMF contact VCBs is measured. The measuring result of post-arc current is accurate and small interference and the post arc charge is obtained. The experimental results verifies that the PACME is correct and accurate, which can be used to measure the post arc characteristic in interrupting test.