pchan12
Newbie
I have a rather unusual problem. I live in an Apartment which has a backup diesel generator (Third world - so erratic power supply). So we have 2 sets of circuit breakers one for the default power supply (25Amps) and one for the backup generator (6 Amps Type-C). The backup is to be used only for "light" appliances and so has a lower threshold.
When the main power is cut, the diesel generator takes about 30 seconds to come online during which there is no power after which we get power from the diesel generator. When this happens we sometime observe the backup MCB trip for certain apartments. This needs to be manually corrected. After the "flip" we don't observe further trips. The tripping happens only during a switchover and only intermittently so it is not deterministic.
One suspicion is "inrush" or "surge" current exceeding the Type C MCB trip curve. When the backup MCB is upgraded to 10A the trips are not observed. But we don't feel comfortable upgrading to 10A as the rating is only for 6A. Also it still doesn't explain how it doesn't trip as appliances should send surge current when the trip is corrected. Maybe some other factor causing it ?
How do we approach the problem ? Look at internal wiring in the individual apartment or faulty appliances, measure inrush current ? Does anyone have any pointers or insights ?
Please redirect if this is not the right forum, I chose this as it seemed to fit...
When the main power is cut, the diesel generator takes about 30 seconds to come online during which there is no power after which we get power from the diesel generator. When this happens we sometime observe the backup MCB trip for certain apartments. This needs to be manually corrected. After the "flip" we don't observe further trips. The tripping happens only during a switchover and only intermittently so it is not deterministic.
One suspicion is "inrush" or "surge" current exceeding the Type C MCB trip curve. When the backup MCB is upgraded to 10A the trips are not observed. But we don't feel comfortable upgrading to 10A as the rating is only for 6A. Also it still doesn't explain how it doesn't trip as appliances should send surge current when the trip is corrected. Maybe some other factor causing it ?
How do we approach the problem ? Look at internal wiring in the individual apartment or faulty appliances, measure inrush current ? Does anyone have any pointers or insights ?
Please redirect if this is not the right forum, I chose this as it seemed to fit...