Thermal effect on the anode electrode surface when a high current interruption in vacuum circuit breaker

When high currents are interrupted in a vacuum circuit breaker, the electrode surface will be melted violently because of a large thermal input to the anode electrode in the arc period. Due to a large thermal input into the electrode surface, a part of the electrode might be melted and deformed. The may affect the interruption performance of the vacuum circuit breaker. The purpose of this study is to investigate of relationship between the energy supplied to the anode surface, the instantaneous value of currents to be interrupted and the wear of the electrode. We used plane electrodes whose diameters are 10mm and 20mm. From the results of measuring the arc currents and voltage, during high current interruption the energy supply per unit area of the anode side are estimated. The electrode surface temperature of the anode side is measured by a two-color pyrometer, we investigated the relationship between the energy supplied to the electrode surface and temperature after current zero point.