Circuit breaker with rating plug having memory
AssigneeWestinghouse Electric Corp.
InventorWilliam J. Murphy
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A microprocessor based circuit breaker has a removable rating plug which provides a reference for the current rating of the breaker. The removable rating plug also has an EEPROM to which the microcomputer of the circuit breaker writes for storage, the number of operations of the circuit breaker operating mechanism and a trip history of the breaker in the form of a count of the number of trips weighted by the magnitude of the trip current. The rating plug is periodically removed and plugged into a portable programmer which selectively displays the number of operations and operating history of the circuit breaker. The programmer clears this operating data when recorded and can write into the EEPROM the style and serial number of the circuit breaker with which the rating plug is to be used.
Claims15
A circuit breaker for an electrical circuit comprising:
- an operating mechanism for interrupting current in the electrical circuit when operated;
- a trip device including a microprocessor which monitors the current in the electrical circuit and generates a trip by automatically operating the operating mechanism to interrupt the current in the electrical current when the current exceeds a selectable value;
- a removable rating plug having means establishing the selectable value of the current at which the trip device trips the operating mechanism, and a nonvolatile memory, said microprocessor in said trip device including means generating service data and writing said service data to the non-volatile memory in the removable rating plug.
A circuit breaker for an electrical circuit comprising:
- an operating mechanism for interrupting current in the electrical circuit when operated;
- means generating an operation signal for each operation of the operating mechanism;
- a trip device including a microprocessor monitoring the current in the electrical circuit and generating a trip by automatically operating said operating mechanism to interrupt current in the electrical circuit when the current exceeds a selectable value, said microprocessor also generating a count of the operations of said operating mechanism from said operation signal;
- and
- a removable plug having a non-volatile memory, said microprocessor in said trip device writing the count of the operations of the operating mechanism into the nonvolatile memory in the removable plug.
In combination:
- a circuit breaker for an electrical circuit comprising:
- an operating mechanism for interrupting current in the electrical circuit when operated;
- a trip device including a microcomputer which monitors the current in the electrical circuit and generates a trip by automatically operating the operating mechanism to interrupt the current in the electrical circuit when the current exceeds a selectable value;
- and
- a removable plug selectably connectable with the trip device and having a non-volatile memory, said microcomputer in said trip device including means generating service data on the operating mechanism and writing said service data in the non-volatile memory in the removable plug;
- and
- a programmer device to which said removable plug when removed from said circuit breaker is alternately connected, said programmer device having means presenting the service data written into the non-volatile memory by said microcomputer in the trip device.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.