Vapor shield for vacuum interrupters
AssigneeEaton Corporation
InventorMichael Bruce Schulman
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A vacuum interrupter (VI) is provided having two arcing contacts, at least one of which is axially moveable, and a metal-vapor condensing shield which is shaped to allow the VI to withstand a high peak value of pulsed or sinusoidal high voltage applied to the cold contacts in their open position. In the region surrounding the open contacts, the vapor shield is shaped to deflect the trajectories of electrons which are emitted from the regions of high electric field stress along the facing edges of the negatively biased contact. The vapor shield causes electrons to be substantially deflected away from the intercontact edge region and onto a defocused area of lower electric field stress on the shield.
Claims17
A vacuum interrupter comprising:
- a sealed vacuum envelope comprising a substantially cylindrical electrically insulating section;
- electrode assemblies comprising contacts inside the electrically insulating section of the vacuum envelope which are separable to form a contact gap;
- and
- a vapor shield between the electrically insulating section of the vacuum envelope and the contacts, the vapor shield including a conductive extended portion adjacent the contact gap extending in a radial direction from the electrically insulating section of the vacuum envelope toward the contact gap, wherein the vapor shield is electrically isolated from at least one of the contacts when the contacts are in an open circuit position and a shortest radial distance from the conductive extended portion to the contacts is less than or equal to a length of the contact gap.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.