Modeling and simulation of the influence of contact structure on the characteristics of high current vacuum arc plasma

Abstract

With the advantages of environmental protection, small size, and light weight, the vacuum circuit breaker has been widely used in power systems. At present, it is developing toward the direction of high voltage and high current. In this paper, the magnetic field simulation model of a cup-shaped axial magnetic contact system is established, and the actual magnetic field data in the arc area are obtained as the boundary conditions, and then a three-dimensional steady-state magnetohydrodynamic model of the vacuum arc is established. The plasma parameter distribution characteristics in the vacuum arc area are studied by changing the number of slots in the contact plate, the angle of the contact cup chute, the length of the slot in the contact plate, and the central process hole. On this basis, a new type of embedded axial magnetic contact system including an embedded magnetic ring and a reverse contact cup is proposed, and the influence of changing the angle and number of inclined slots of the embedded contact cup on the arc distribution characteristics at the peak current and current zero is further studied. The simulation results show that the new structure contact is helpful to the breaking capacity of the vacuum switch and has a guiding significance for the design of the vacuum circuit breaker. By comparison, our simulation results have the same trend with the experimental results of other researchers.

Study of vacuum arc plasma transport characteristics during the DC interrupting process

“…Based on Lijun Wang's model, Dingge Yang conducted a simulation study on the dynamic characteristics of vacuum arc, and further considered the effects of electrode spacing variation and magnetic field [14]. In [15][16][17][18][19][20][21], the corresponding vacuum arc simulation models were developed to consider the effects of transverse magnetic field, anode vapor, metal particles, and external transverse magnetic field on the vacuum arc characteristics, respectively. In general, many scholars and experts have conducted a lot of simulation research on vacuum arc in general, but most of the research is to establish a steady-state simulation model for AC arc of power frequency, or to establish a transient model but get the steady-state solution, and did not achieve the simulation of the transient characteristics of the vacuum DC arc.…”

Numerical investigation on the influence of metal particles on the characteristics of a high-current vacuum arc

“…The vacuum arc plasma is mainly provided by the evaporation and ionization of the electrode material. Because of its application in vacuum interrupter [1][2][3], * Author to whom any correspondence should be addressed.…”

“…The 'vacuum interrupter' is so named because its arc extinguishing medium and the insulating medium between contacts are high vacuum. Vacuum interrupters are widely used in medium and high voltage distribution systems [1][2][3]. For vacuum interrupters, arc characteristics are critical for the success of current interruption.…”