Comparison Of Arc Erosion Coefficients

Abstract

The problem of nonunified approaches to giving arc erosion ratios is addressed for the application of molded case circuit breakers (MCCBs) in the range 6.5-10 kA. Charge, Joule’s integral and arc energy are compared as possible quantities to use for ratios of mass loss. The linearity of the relationship of mass loss to those quantities was used as the main metric. By this metric the ratio to charge was chosen as the most reliable one. But this relation was constant only for fixed contacts with arcrunners. For the moving contact, the mass loss ratio was a linear function of the effective value of the passing current.