Method of forming a contact piece for a circuit breaker
AssigneeABB Schweiz AG
InventorsChristoph Kenel, Markus Hoidis, Thierry Delachaux
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method for forming a contact piece for a circuit breaker, the contact piece comprising a reinforcement phase and a conductive phase, the method comprising: providing a slurry of the reinforcement phase in liquid; freeze casting the slurry, to form a cast comprising a frozen liquid structure and a reinforcement phase structure; removing the frozen liquid structure from the cast, to form a foam comprising the reinforcement phase structure; sintering the foam, to form a sintered foam; and infiltrating the sintered foam with the conductive phase, to form a piece part.
Claims14
A method for forming a contact piece for a circuit breaker, the contact piece comprising a reinforcement phase and a conductive phase, the method comprising:
- providing a slurry of the reinforcement phase in liquid, wherein the liquid comprises an organic solvent;
- freeze casting the slurry to form a cast comprising a frozen liquid structure and a reinforcement phase structure;
- removing the frozen liquid structure from the cast to form a foam comprising the reinforcement phase structure;
- sintering the foam to form a sintered foam;
- and
- infiltrating the sintered foam with the conductive phase to form a piece part;
- wherein the reinforcement phase comprises WC, or Cr;
- and wherein the conductive phase comprises Cu, or Ag.
A method for forming a contact for a circuit breaker, the contact comprising a contact piece and a contact stem, the method comprising:
- forming the contact piece by:
- providing a slurry of the reinforcement phase in liquid, wherein the liquid comprises an organic solvent;
- freeze casting the slurry to form a cast comprising a frozen liquid structure and a reinforcement phase structure;
- removing the frozen liquid structure from the cast to form a foam comprising the reinforcement phase structure;
- sintering the foam to form a sintered foam;
- infiltrating the sintered foam with the conductive phase to form a piece part;
- and
- connecting the contact piece to the contact stem;
- wherein the reinforcement phase comprises WC, or Cr;
- and wherein the conductive phase comprises Cu, or Ag.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.