Continue to Site

Eng-Tips is the largest engineering community on the Internet

Intelligent Work Forums for Engineering Professionals

  • Congratulations IDS on being selected by the Eng-Tips community for having the most helpful posts in the forums last week. Way to Go!

when I was inspecting a medium volt

Status
Not open for further replies.

144x

Electrical
Mar 15, 2001
123
when I was inspecting a medium voltage switchgear I noticed that in some parts the silver plated buses are in direct contact with copper busbars.when I commented, they said that they have sold many of this equipment without having heard of a problem.any idea on how this bimetalic junction works?
 
Replies continue below

Recommended for you

Silver on copper in itself should be fine, but if this is a current carrying junction it partially defeats the purpose. (They should both be plated in that case)
 
but the anodic index of the two metals does not let them to be in direct contact.
 
Most manufactures usually ring plate the joints as a minimum but silver plated copper to bare copper connections shouldn't cause any excess heating. It is done in the majority of assemblies 600V=/-
 
Silver plating of copper bus is very common in 4-25 KV switchgears(at least where I work). In my 15 plus years of Substation experience, I've yet to see a problem develop with copper to silver plated copper connections. Although I don't see the logic in plating only one side of the connection, I'm quite sure that properly prepared connections pose few if any problems.

 
Suggestion: Silver as well as copper is subject to oxidation. Therefore, the connection must be tight for all combinations, i.e.
copper on copper
silver on copper
silver on silver
 
This silver plating is also common in newer ASCO ATSs. They use the plating with a very expensive conductive grease.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Part and Inventory Search

Sponsor