New vacuum arc control technology and its application

This paper presents the vacuum arc characteristics and the high current interruption ability of several sizes of electrodes which are applied in the authors' new vacuum arc control method named "SADE: self arc diffusion by electrode". The arc behavior of the test electrode during the arcing period was observed by a high speed video camera. For extremely high interruption current, the arc of the conventional AMF electrode concentrates, causing local heating of the electrode, but the arc of SADE diffuses over the whole contact area, thus avoiding local heating. The interruption ability of SADE is about 200% that of the conventional AMF with the same size electrode. By applying our new are control method to VCB, it can be made more compact and lighter than the conventional type.