COMMUNICATION INTERFACE FOR BUS CONNECTED CIRCUIT BREAKERS

摘要

The present invention provides a circuit breaker control arrangement that is reliable, accurate and cost-effective to manufacture, install and maintain. This circuit breaker arrangement also provides increased modularity by alleviating the need for installing wires to connect each circuit breaker with the control station. The present invention uses circuit breakers (12) that contain internal control technology for interrupting and establishing an associated current path. At least one coded signal designates each circuit breaker, and a communication bus (30) carries these coded signals to each circuit breaker. Decoding technology (55) located on each circuit breaker determines whether the coded signal corresponds to that circuit breaker. If the coded signal does correspond to that circuit breaker, then the decoding technology responds by sending the appropriate response signal over the communication bus, and the circuit breaker's internal control technology either interrupts or establishes the associated current path.