SWITCHGEAR AND PROTECTION

L20-L21
FUSES
Dr. H.V. Gururaja Rao
Associate Professor
Department of E&EE
MIT, MAHE, Manipal

29-Feb-24 Switchgear and Protection 4

 Fuse
➢ Simplest protective device to protect electrical equipment against excessive currents (due to overload
or short circuit).
➢ Connected in series with the equipment to be protected.
➢ Carries normal working current safely.
➢ Melts due to overheating when current exceeds safe limit and thus disconnects and protects the
equipment.
➢ Weakest element in the circuit.
Materials for fuse element
Desirable properties:
• Low melting point
• High conductivity (low specific resistance)
• Less deterioration due to oxidation.
• Cheap

Commonly used materials: Tin, lead, Zinc, Aluminum, Copper, Silver etc.
 Tin, lead and zinc have low melting point but high specific resistance .
 Lead and zinc are affected by oxidation but tin is not easily subjected to oxidation.
 Aluminum and copper have low specific resistance but high melting point and are subjected to
oxidation.
 Silver has low specific resistance but high melting point. How ever it is not subjected to oxidation.
 Tin, lead, zinc and aluminum are cheap; Copper is costly and silver is very costly.

❖ For currents les than 15A, an alloy of tin and lead is usually used.
❖ Above 15A usually copper is used.
❖ For reliable protection of costly and precious equipments, silver is preferred.
Types of fuses
1. Rewirable type
2. Totally enclosed or cartridge type
Rewirable type:
Here after the operation, the blown out fuse element can be replaced by a new one.
Types of rewirable fuses:
Open type: Consists of a thin piece of fuse element made of tin, lead or copper, directly inserted
in the circuit without any enclosure.
▪ Simplest and cheapest type of protection.
▪ Rarely used because of risk of shock and fire, unreliable operation due to oxidation.
Semi enclosed type
❖ Consists of a base and a carrier
❖ Base is made of porcelain; carries two fixed
contacts to which the incoming and outgoing
conductors (phase wires) are connected; It is
usually fixed to the panel/ meter board.
❖ Carrier is made of porcelain; It holds the fuse
element (wire) between its terminals; It is
detachable; Can be inserted in to or taken out
of the base, when ever necessary.
❖ When excessive current flows through the
circuit, fuse element melts. Fuse carrier can
then be taken out, the fuse wire can be
replaced by a new one and the carrier can be
reinserted to the base.
Definitions of important terms
▪ (Normal) Rated current: Maximum current in Arms which the fuse element can carry
continuously without over heating or melting.
▪ Fusing current : Minimum current in Arms at which the fuse wire melts and disconnects
the protected equipment / circuit.
➢Fusing current depends on the material, length, area of cross section, shape of the fuse
element, type of enclosure etc.
3
➢For a round fuse wire, fusing current = K * 𝑑 , where ‘K’ is a constant which depends
2
on the material and ‘d’ is the diameter of the fuse wire in cm.
In case of stranded fuse wire, minimum fusing current for 2, 3, 4 and 7 strands will respectively be
1.66, 2.25, 2.75 and 4 times the fusing current for a single stranded fuse wire.

Fusing factor: Ratio of fusing current to the rated current; Always greater than unity. It is about
1.5 to 1.7 for semi enclosed fuse and about 1.2 to 1.3 for totally enclosed fuse.
Cut off characteristics of a fuse:
When a fault occurs, current through the fuse element will be asymmetrical. In case of heavy short
circuit currents, sufficient heat energy is released to melt the fuse element well before the peak of
the first loop is reached.
Cut off characteristics
Cut off current (ic): Instantaneous value of current at which the fuse element melts.
Prospective current: Current that would have flown in the circuit in the absence of a fuse.
Ip is the peak value of the prospective current.
Prospective current is usually defined as the rms value of the ac component of the first loop of the fault
current.
Pre arcing time : Time from the instant of occurrence of the fault to the instant of cut off.
Arcing time: After the fuse element melts, an arc is initiated, and it gets extinguished after a short time.
Arcing time is the time between the instant of cut off and the instant when the arc is completely
extinguished.
Total operating time: Time between instant of fault occurrence and the instant at which the current is
fully interrupted; Sum of pre arcing and arcing times.
Rupturing or breaking capacity: Largest prospective current which the fuse can break satisfactorily at
the rated voltage. It can be expressed in terms of MVA also.
 Time–current characteristics of a fuse
• Usually drawn between pre arcing time and
prospective current.
• Fuse exhibits inverse time current
characteristics.
• For currents close to fusing current, it takes
very long time for operation.
• As prospective current increases, time of
operation decreases as shown.
• Minimum current below which the fuse
does not operate is called the (minimum)
fusing current.
Time–current characteristics of a fuse
Totally enclosed fuse
High Rupturing Capacity (HRC) Fuse
Construction
• Outer body: Cylindrical, heat resisting ceramic body.
• End caps: Usually made of brass; screwed to the ceramic body.
• Contact blades: Made of metal, welded to the metal end caps.
The fuse unit is bolted to the board using these blades.
• Fillingmaterial : Space with in the body, surrounding the fuse
element is completely packed with a filling powder; usually
chalk, plaster of paris or quartz. It helps in arc quenching.
• Fuse element: Ends of the fuse element are connected to end
caps. Fuse element is either pure silver or bimetallic; Usually
not a single long wire, but made of two or more sections joined
by a tin joint.
➢With single long wire, during melting, a string of droplets is
formed and an arc is struck across each of the droplets. Later
these droplets evaporate and a long arc is formed.
➢Tin has much lower melting point than silver; It melts first and
prevents the formation of a long arc and also prevents silver
from attaining a high temperature.
Selection of fuses
Points to consider:
• It should be able to carry rated (normal) current and momentary over currents due to starting a
motor, switching a transformer under no load, switching a capacitor bank etc. and should not
operate.
• Should not fail to operate when a sustained over load or short circuit occurs.
• Should have proper coordination with the other protective devices.

✓ Selection of a fuse depends on the type of the load circuit i.e. whether it is a
I. Steady load circuit (Sudden changes in current are not expected .Eg.: Heating devices)
II. Fluctuating load circuit (Sudden changes in current are expected. Eg.: Motors, Transformers
etc.)
 ❖ In case of steady load circuit
i. If both overload and short circuit protection is required, a fuse with a current rating slightly
higher than the anticipated rated load current is selected.
ii. If only short circuit protection is required, a fuse of much higher current rating than the
rated current of the load is selected.

❖ In case of fluctuating loads, the time current characteristics of the fuse must be above the
transient current characteristics of the load with a sufficient margin as shown in the fig. for a
motor.
 Discrimination (Coordination) between two fuses
❖ When more than one protective device are used to protect a circuit, then discrimination means correct operation of the
correct protective device, in the event of a fault.
❖ Consider radial feeders protected by fuses as shown.
❖ For a fault ‘F’ on feeder ‘2’ , fault current flows through both the fuses F1 and F2.
❖ How ever only F2 should operate.

Feeder 1 Feeder 2

F1 F2
F

❖ For this the characteristics of the two fuses are so selected that for any fault on feeder ‘2’, the pre arcing time of fuse
‘1’ must be more than the total clearing time of fuse ‘2’.

❖ If F2 fails to operate, then F1 provides back up protection.