Switchgear Replacement

[candu6]

I am performing some preliminary engineering to upgrade our 20+ year Westinghouse DHP and DH switchgear breakers with new replacement breakers. Does anyone have any experiences upgrading switchgear breakers or any good tips or lessons learned that I can take advantage of?
The replacement breakers are advertised as direct roll-in replacements, but there are always small hitches.

 

[dpc]

Most of the projects I have worked on where new vacuum breakers were retrofit have gone quite well. The problems mainly relate to customization of the control wiring that was not reflected in the original factory wiring diagrams.

Things usually go a little smoother if you can stick with the original switchgear manufacturer for the new breakers.

 

[buzzp]

Make sure the contractor observes where the electrical and physical stops are in the old switchgear. We recently upgraded ours and the contractor did not move the mechanical stop and ran the breaker into this stop until all the gears where stripped in the lifting mechanism. This put us out two additional days while he miraculously found replacement gears from a breaker junk yard in Nebraska. It could have been avoided but they insisted on not moving these stops unless their engineer said too. You see the result.
Other than that, our replacement went ok other than the ground shoe on the breaker enclosure was not the right size and had to be modified.
We still have yet to put one in successfully but we are on hold due to other projects and the contractors schedule. I think it will all go smoothly from here on out.
Ours are Magneblast type AM breakers being fitted with vacuum.

 

[LKOT591]

We are in the 6th year of a multi-year project to upgrade our 5kV DHP breakers. Some of the things we have run across include the following:

Check the snubber adjustment to have the replacement breaker fit correctly in the existing cubicle.

Test the control wiring on each breaker for trip and close operation prior to scheduling a field shutdown.

There are some other minor items which have cropped up occasionally but are the exception rather than the rule.

Contact me if you would like some more information