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US 8,134,428 B2Granted
Circuit breaker with electronic sensing and de-latch activation
AssigneeSiemens Industry, Inc.
InventorsRussell T. Watford, Kevin Miller
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A circuit breaker and method includes a mechanical pole moveable between a latched position and an unlatched position to open an electrical connection between a pair of electrical contacts. An electronic tripping device is configured to respond to a sensor signal. The sensor signal is output from a condition sensor wherein upon receiving the sensor signal the electronic tripping device trips the mechanical pole into the unlatched position.
Claims19
A circuit breaker, comprising:
- a mechanical pole moveable between a latched position and an unlatched position to open an electrical connection between a pair of electrical contacts wherein the mechanical pole is coupled to a cradle which pivots about a pivot point such that, in the latched position, a latch bite portion of the cradle contacts a plunger and is biased by a spring against the plunger;
- and
- an electronic tripping device including a solenoid for tripping the mechanical pole, the electronic tripping device configured to sense and respond to at least one sensor signal, the at least one sensor signal being output from at least one condition sensor which detects at least one of an overload condition and an instantaneous condition wherein upon receiving the at least one sensor signal the electronic tripping device activates the solenoid to trip the mechanical pole into the unlatched position wherein during a condition, the cradle is released by the plunger to cause the mechanical pole to break contact between the electrical contacts.
A circuit breaker, comprising:
- a mechanical pole moveable between a latched position and an unlatched position to open an electrical connection between a pair of electrical contacts wherein the mechanical pole is coupled to a cradle which pivots about a pivot point;
- an actuator device configured to respond to a sensor signal and move a plunger to release the mechanical pole to the unlatched position in accordance with a biasing device and wherein in the latched position the cradle is oriented such that a latch bite portion of the cradle contacts the plunger and is biased by a spring against the plunger;
- at least one sensor configured to monitor conditions of a circuit and to provide the sensor signal;
- and
- a trip circuit embodied in an integrated circuit being responsive to the sensor signal when the conditions exceed a threshold indicative of at least one of an overload condition and an instantaneous condition wherein the trip circuit electronically generates a trip signal in accordance with the sensor signal exceeding the threshold to activate the actuator device to move the plunger such that plunger no longer contacts the latch bite portion to release the cradle and trip the mechanical pole into the unlatched position.
2 more elements
A method for breaking a circuit, comprising:
- providing a circuit breaker having a mechanical pole moveable between a latched position and an unlatched position to open an electrical connection between a pair of electrical contacts wherein the mechanical pole is coupled to a cradle which pivots about a pivot point such that, in the latched position, a latch bite portion of the cradle contacts a plunger and is biased by a spring against the plunger;
- providing an actuator device for moving the plunger to release the mechanical pole to the unlatched position;
- setting the circuit breaker to a latched position to provide a closed circuit loop through the circuit breaker;
- monitoring current in the closed circuit loop using an electronic circuit to determine when circuit conditions exceed at least one threshold value indicative of at least one of an overload condition and an instantaneous condition;
- and
- tripping the circuit breaker using an electronic signal generated by an integrated circuit chip when the circuit conditions exceed the at least one threshold value to activate the actuator device and move the plunger to release the cradle to cause the mechanical pole to break contact between the electrical contacts.
3 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.