PREDICTING THE REMAINING LIFE OF SERVICE AGED VACUUM INTERRUPTERS-A WHITE PAPER

摘要

A very large percentage of the vacuum interrupters (Ⅵ) that are in service today, have reached or exceeded the manufacturer specified life-span. As might be expected, Ⅵ failures have risen rapidly in the last ten years, and many of them have been caused by or related to loss of vacuum. Unfortunately, none of the existing field tests have the ability to determine the pressure inside a VI, nor can they predict the rate of vacuum loss. Newly researched and developed test procedures coupled with Condition Based Maintenance (CBM) algorithms offer a solution to this problem. This paper describes the classic field tests for Vis and explains why they do not provide all of the needed diagnostic and prognostic information. Full details about the required test hardware and field testing procedures are included. The paper concludes with a description of the CBM algorithm that will be used for prognostic purposes. Field test data is included and discussed to give the reader a better understanding of the entire process.