Experimentation of Electrical Disruption in Medium Voltage Switchgear

Medium voltage circuit breakers are critical elements for the correct operation of the electrical system. Disruptive discharges occur when current completely crosses the insulator, separating two conductors with different potentials. Numerous studies have been carried out on breakdown discharges. However, there are still challenges to understand the factors that influence it and to improve its prediction and control, especially for students of careers related to this subject. In the present work, a mathematical simulation of the electrical breakdown of oil in a medium-voltage cell is carried out using commercial software to improve the understanding of this phenomenon. The results obtained are compared with the experimental part implemented in the high voltage laboratory of the manufacturer TERCO, belonging to the Salesian Polytechnic University; the test consisted of obtaining values of breakdown voltages using oil as a dielectric medium in a capacitor switch of thirteen thousand eight hundred kilo volts, with which the closing and opening of its contacts was performed. In the results obtained, it was observed that the voltage changes at the power switch terminals. The circuit with an industive resistive load is fed with two hundred and twenty volts and is left to obtain its stator state, the voltage at the terminals of the switch reaches zero volts, but after opening the circuit it increases to two hundred and eighty volts.