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US 4,603,313 AGranted
Circuit breaker with replaceable rating plug interlock and push to trip button
AssigneeWestinghouse Electric Corp.
InventorsAlan B. Shimp, William E. Beatty, Jr.
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A circuit breaker characterized by a pair of separable contacts, trip means operable automatically in response to overload current conditions to open the contacts which means include a rotatable trip bar biased in an untripped position, and interlock means including a manually operable button for rotating the trip bar to a tripped position when the button is pushed and for rotating a cam into tripped and untripped positions when the button is rotated.
Claims17
A circuit breaker comprising:
- a housing;
- a circuit breaker structure supported in the housing;
- the circuit breaker structure having a pair of contacts operable to open and close an electric circuit;
- a releasable mechanism;
- first manually operable means manually operable when the releasable mechanism is in a latched position to open and close the contacts;
- trip means operable automatically in response to overload current conditions above a predetermined value to release the releasable mechanism whereupon the releasable mechanism automatically moves from the latched position to a tripped position to open the contacts;
- the first manually operable means being operable to move the releasable mechanism from the tripped position to the latched position following release of the releasable mechanism;
- latch means operable between latching and unlatching positions to latch the releasable mechanism;
- trip means including an externally accessible replaceable rating adjuster removably supported on the housing;
- interlock means automatically maintaining the releasable mechanism in the tripped position when the replaceable rating adjuster is removed from the housing;
- a trip bar extending between the adjuster and the latch means and biased in the untripped position;
- the interlock means including second manually operable means operable between retracted and protracted positions to move the trip bar to the tripped position;
- and
- the interlock means including third manually operable means operable between locking and unlocking positions of the trip bar;
- whereby the latch means is inoperable in the locking position.
12 more elements
A circuit breaker comprising:
- a housing;
- a circuit breaker structure within the housing an having a pair of separable contacts operable to open and close an electric circuit;
- a releasable mechanism;
- first manually operable means operable only when the releasable mechanism is in a latched position to open and close the contacts;
- trip means operable automatically in response to overload current conditions above a predetermined value to release the releasable mechanism from a latched position and to thereby open the contacts;
- latch means operable between latching and unlatching positions to latch the releasable mechanism;
- the trip means including an externally accessible replaceable rating adjuster removably supported on the housing;
- interlock means automatically maintaining the releasable mechanism in the tripped position when the replaceable rating adjuster is removed from the housing;
- a trip bar extending between the adjuster and the latch means and having a transverse surface at an angle to the axis of the trip bar;
- a trip button biased on a retracted position through the housing and extendable to engage the transverse surface and to thereby rotate the trip bar to the tripped position;
- a rotatable member having a cam surface movable upon rotation of the member into and out of tripping engagement with the transverse surface;
- the trip button being connected to the rotatable member so as to cause rotation of the member into and out of tripping engagement with the transverse surface;
- and
- the trip button extending through a rectangular bore in the rotatable member and having a rectangular cross-section engageable and positioned in the rectangular bore for rotation of the member.
11 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.