Flexible Pulsed Dc- Source for Investigations of Hvdc Circuit Breaker Arc Resistance

The paper discusses the design of a flexible pulsed current source needed for experimental research of switching arcs in HVDC circuit breakers with passive resonance circuits. The source drives a current pulse from a pre-charged capacitor and forms it using an IGBT switch operated at 10kHz. The current source will be used to measure stationary and transient UIcharacteristics of switching arcs in test circuit breakers with modifiable nozzle geometries, blow gas pressures, gas types and current slopes. The measurements aim to understand and optimize the arc for fast interruption of large HVDC currents. In this paper, the current source principle is presented and the optimal parameter layout and measurement strategy analyzed, using simulations of an arc in Matlab Simulink with a Mayr model.