About Contact Resistance Monitoring and Vibration Analysis of a Power Circuit Breaker

Circuit breakers are important elements of the electrical system that have the role of protecting these electrical energy distribution and transport systems with the ability to establish, maintain, and interrupt the currents corresponding to the normal operating regime as well as the fault currents. Monitoring and diagnosis of circuit breakers is a very important aspect in their maintenance, with a significant impact on availability, and cost reduction by adopting predictive maintenance. Evaluating the critical parameters of the circuit breaker without disassembling the component parts greatly reduces downtime and maintenance costs. The paper intends to present aspects of monitoring and diagnosing an SF6 high-voltage circuit breaker, a measurement system used for data acquiring of contact resistance and vibration, and their analysis.