Simulation of electric and thermal fields of high voltage interrupter vacuum chamber

In this study 3D model of electric field and thermal field distributions of high voltage vacuum chamber is developed. The coupled electric-thermal field problem is formulated and finite element method is applied to calculate the electric field and temperature distributions in vacuum chamber. The heat sources are obtained by electric field analysis. The electric arc discharge conductivity is nonlinearly related to the electric field intensity and arc temperature. The temperature of the interrupter contact system surface has been used to study the operational characteristics of the vacuum chamber.