Arcing Characteristics on Low-Voltage DC Circuit Breakers

Hyosung Kim
Kongju National University
275 Budae, Cheonan, Chungnam, 330-717 Korea
Tel.: +82 / (41) 521-9167
Fax: +82 / (41) 563-3689
E-Mail: hyoskim@kongju.ac.kr
URL: http://control.kongju.ac.kr

Acknowledgements
This research was supported by Basic Technical Research Program in 2012 funded by Korea Electric
Power Company (KEPCO) (No. R13TA04).

Keywords
«DC power supply», «Magnetic device», «Safety», «Circuit Breaker», «Arc extinguisher»

Abstract
Removing the fault current in DC circuits is comparably difficult since the DC current has
non zero-crossing point like in AC current [1,2]. Thus, developing dedicated DC circuit
breakers is necessary to get safety for human body and electrical facilities [3,4]. This paper
proposed a novel DC circuit breaker against inductive loads. The performance of the proposed
DC circuit breaker was verified by an experimental circuit breaker test system.

Introduction
There is increasing interest in DC distribution systems according to increased DC type load due to
rapid increase in digital products and expansion of DC type distributed generation technology such as
PV generation etc. [1,2]. However it is difficult to break arc current when short-circuit occurs in load
side because electric current in DC has non zero point like AC [3]. Accordingly, development of
appropriate breaking technology in DC is required in order to protect the system from fault current to
secure safety of human body, powered equipment and instruments [4].

The size of arc voltage generated between both electric contacts becomes an important variable for
circuit breaker. Breaking of short-circuit is relatively easy for AC circuit since there is a point at which
the current passes through zero for every half cycle. However for DC circuit, it is relatively difficult to
break short-circuit since high arc voltage between the electric contacts is required to attenuate the flow
of fault current which does not become zero by itself. There is possibility of large scale fire if circuit
breaker does not acquire enough arc voltage to eliminate the arc current in DC distribution network.
This is one of the important factors why popularization of DC distribution network has been reluctant
despite its many advantages.

This paper proposes arc extinguishing technique by concentrated tandem-disposed magnets for low-
voltage DC circuit breakers and also proposes ways to attenuate arc voltage by developing diode-
resistor branch for inductive loads [5,6]. Proposed theory is verified by experimental set-up for testing
inductive load DC breaking characteristics in compliance to Standard for Low-Voltage DC Power
Circuit Breakers Used in Enclosures of IEEE C37.14-2004.

Mechanisms of DC Circuit Breaker

Arc-current extinguishing by magnet
The magnetic arc-extinguishing technique places magnetic line of force formed from magnet
perpendicular to the flow of arc current that occurs from electrical contact points. Then, magnetic
force is developed to the arc current as shown in Fig. 1b) according to Flaming’s left hand rule and arc
current is dispersed into space, which increases the arc resistance value. Accordingly, effect of
reduced trip time is expected through fast consumption of arc energy.

(a) Structure of magnetic arc-extinguisher (b) Flaming’s left hand rule

Fig. 1 Principle of arc-extinguisher

(a) Single magnet (b) Tandem-disposed dual magnets

Fig. 2 Principle of tandem magnets to increase magnet flux density at contact points

The strength of magnetic force which generates magnetic arc extinguishing is proportional to the size
of magnet flux density at contact points. When single magnet is used as shown in Fig. 2a), the
effective magnet flux density reduces by being inversely proportional to the square of distance to the
contact points since magnet flux disperses in radial shape. This paper proposed tandem-disposed dual
magnets to increase the magnet flux density at contact points as shown in Fig. 2b).

Arc-voltage attenuation by diode-resistor branch

In case of inductive load including inductors, very high self-induced voltage (back EMF) is generated
from inductor upon breaking of load current [7]. Application of Kirchhoff ’s voltage law on the circuit
of Fig. 1a) allows for easy calculation of arc voltage applied on the breaker contact points as Equation
(1).

(1)

where, : Rated power voltage

: Equivalent inductance of load circuit
: Equivalent resistance of load circuit
: Arc voltage
: Load current.
Back EMF from inductor in Equation (1) may reach thousands of volts. Because such back EMF
increases arc voltage between breaker’s contact points, it leads to serious damage to breaker and even
reach break failure. This is very dangerous since it may lead to electric fire accident.
Arc voltage attenuator that uses diode-resistor branch as shown in Fig. 3 is proposed in order to
prevent the back EMF from increasing arc voltage of breaker’s contact points. Arc voltage attenuator
limits the size of back EMF by bypassing the load current into diode-resistor branch when back EMF
is about to be created according to sudden decrease of load current in load inductor. Here, arc voltage
created at breaker’s electric contact points is calculated as shown in Equation (2).

Fig. 3 Arc voltage attenuation by diode-resistor branch

(2)
As shown in Equation (2), arc voltage applied on breaker’s electric contact points reduces significantly
compared to Equation (1), due to removal of back EMF from load inductor by diode-resistor branch.
RD resistor has a major function of releasing energy that was stored in load inductor to let load current
reach to zero quickly. However, small amount of voltage drop, IRD is added to arc voltage.

Proposed DC circuit breaker

Fig. 4 shows conceptual diagram of finally proposed hybrid arc extinguisher in DC circuit breaker for
effect DC circuit breaking in inductive loads. Magnetic arc-extinguishing is created perpendicular to
electric contact points through tandem-disposed magnets. Output terminal of DC circuit breaker
controls reduction gradient of load current by accessing resistor-diode branch in parallel as shown in
the figure and also limits the arc voltage created from contact points of breaker to within tolerable
ranges.

Fig. 4 Proposed hybrid arc-extinguisher in DC circuit breaker

Experiment on DC Circuit Breaking Characteristics

Experimental set-up
For testing DC circuit breaking characteristics, 25 lead acid batteries with nominal voltage of 12 VDC
and nominal capacity of 40Ah were connected in series to form battery bank of 300 VDC in order to
minimize external disturbance factors while maintaining stable power voltage. Batteries eventually
reach a non-dischargeable state due to reduction in terminal voltage according to battery discharge.
Accordingly, DC power supply for regular back-up charging was placed. Moreover, 5-phase step motor
was allowed to conduct the experiment on DC circuit breaking characteristics according to contact
speed of electric contacts by controlling it. Figure 5 shows photo of DC circuit breaker used in this
experiment and Figure 6 shows actual test bed prepared for DC circuit breaking experiment.
 Fig. 5 Photo of DC circuit breaker.

Fig. 6 DC Circuit breaker test bed.

Test Conditions
Experiment shall be conducted for pure resistive load and inductive load. Pure resistive load pertains to
application in digital load such as servers in internet data center (IDC) in which load current is typically
5A or below. This experiment shall test circuit breaking properties for pure resistive load of
300VDC/10A in consideration of some tolerance. Accordingly, resistive load was selected to be 30Ω to
allow 10A of electric current to circuit.
For load inductance to test breaker performance in inductive load that is generally applied such as in
homes and buildings, inductance of 600mH was applied to satisfy the time constant 0.02s ~ 0.06s of
durability test conditions for circuit breakers as outlined in IEEE Standards C37.14 [8]. Here, time
constant is calculated as shown in Equation (3). Table 1 shows parameters for circuit breaker
experiment system.

(3)

Table 1 Test conditions

Parameters Value
Vin 300[VDC]
RLoad 30[Ω]
LLoad 600[mH]
Load Current 10[A]
Contact type Cu
Contact moving speed 50~150[mm/sec]
Magnet type NdFeB
Experimental Results for pure resistive load
Firstly, circuit breaker experiment was conducted by only using pure electric contacts without using
magnetic arc-extinguishing. As shown in Figure 7, results of conducting experiment by setting the
contact speed of electric contacts at 50mm/sec caused trip time to be delayed to 400ms and also lead to
continuous arcing on contact points. The long trip time and high energy of arc current in contact points
may develop into fire accident causing damage to human life and properties. As shown in Figure 8a),
decrease in trip time up to approximately 172m was observed as contact speed of electric contact was
made faster. However, even if contact speed of electric contacts becomes faster than 100ms, trip time
does not improve so much. Thus the contact speed was increased up to 150ms in this experiment.

Fig. 7 Experimental waveforms with Fig. 8 Experimental waveforms with

pure breaker contacts single magnet extinguisher

In order to reduce the long trip time, this paper conducted experiment by using electric contacts on
magnetic arc-extinguisher like the one shown in Figure 2a. As shown in Figure 8, test results showed
that trip time reduced to 15ms, which is approximately 97% improvement and also empirically
verified the excellence of electric contacts proposed in this study.

Figure 9 shows the experimental results of each arc extinguisher for electric contacts. Results of using
the proposed focused magnetic arc-extinguisher further reduced the trip time of 12ms as shown in
Figure 9a). Moreover, unstable arc voltage stabilized when using focused magnetic arc-extinguisher as
shown in Figure 9b).

(a) Trip time[ms] (b) Max arc voltage[V]

Fig. 9 Experimental waveforms for pure resistive load according to arc extinguishing circuits (magnet
distance: 10[mm])

Experimental Results for inductive load

Figure 10 shows test results of circuit breaking capability in inductive load by using tandem-disposed
magnetic arc-extinguisher technique as proposed in Figure 2a)[6]. As expected, very high inductive
voltage of approximately 1300V occurred between the contacts when circuit breaking took place and
delay of trip time to 70ms was observed.

Figure 11 shows test results of applying hybrid arc extinguisher as proposed in Figure 4 in order to
attenuate the occurrence of high inductive voltage from inductive loads. Through application of the
proposed hybrid arc extinguisher in DC circuit breaker, reduction in arc voltage to 311V and decrease
in trip time to 22ms were clearly observed.

Figure 12 shows the experimental result that compares the circuit breaking performance according to
contact speeds from using magnet arc extinguisher as shown in Figure 2a) and using hybrid arc
extinguisher as shown in Figure 4. As shown in previous section of the experiment, linear reduction in
trip time according to increase in contact speed was observed but there was not much relative decrease
of trip time at contact speeds higher than 100mm/sec.

Fig. 10 Experimental waveforms for Inductive load Fig. 11 Experimental waveforms for Inductive load
by magnet arc extinguishing circuit by hybrid arc extinguishing circuit
(magnet distance: 20[mm], speed: 150[mm/sec]) (magnet distance: 20[mm], speed: 150[mm/sec])

(a) Trip time[ms] (b) Max Arc-Voltage[V]

Fig. 12 Experimental results for Inductive load according to each arc extinguisher (magnet distance: 20[mm],
break speed: 150[mm/sec])

Figure 13 shows the analysis of experiment results according to contact speed and distance between
magnet and electric contact points as proposed in this study. It was observed that trip time improved as
magnet distance became nearer. However, it is not desirable to decrease magnet distance to be less
than 20mm because magnet might be damaged due to high arc current that occurs during circuit
breaking of inductive loads.

Figure 13. DC breaking characteristics at inductive load

Conclusion
In this study, several arc extinguishing method were proposed and experiments on its circuit breaking
capabilities were conducted to reduce trip time in resistive load and inductive load in DC distributive
system. Single-magnet extinguisher improved long trip time of 400ms shown in electric contact
structure with pure electric contacts by 97% to 15ms, which was further improved to 12ms by using
dual magnetic arc extinguisher.
Hybrid arc extinguisher that uses dual magnetic extinguisher and arc-attenuation circuit was proposed
and its properties were tested in order to reduce trip time and arc voltage of DC circuit breaker in
inductive loads. For dual magnet arc extinguisher, two magnets were placed in tandem to maximize
the magnetic force at electric contact points in order to improve the trip time. Moreover, arc-
attenuating circuit that uses diode and dump resistor greatly attenuated arc voltage that occurs in
inductive loads.
Test results for inductive loads compared to results of single magnetic extinguisher showed that hybrid
arc-extinguisher had trip time of approximately 22ms, which is three times faster compared to 70ms,
and arc voltage of approximately 311V, which is less than 1/4 of 1300V.

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