Electromechanical protective relays at

a hydroelectric generating plant. The

relays are in round glass cases. The
rectangular devices are test
connection blocks, used for testing
and isolation of instrument
transformer circuits.
Protective relay
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
In electrical engineering, a protective relay is a device designed to trip a circuit breaker when a fault is detected.
The first protective relays were electromagnetic devices, relying on coils operating on moving parts to provide
detection of abnormal operating conditions such as over-current, over-voltage, reverse power flow, over- and
under- frequency. Microprocessor-based digital protection relays now emulate the original devices, as well as
providing types of protection and supervision impractical with electromechanical relays. In many cases a single
microprocessor relay provides functions that would take two or more electromechanical devices. By combining
several functions in one case, numerical relays also save capital cost and maintenance cost over electromechanical
relays. However, due to their very long life span, tens of thousands of these "silent sentinels" are still protecting
transmission lines and electrical apparatus all over the world. An important transmission line or generator unit will
have cubicles dedicated to protection, with many individual electromechanical devices, or one or two
microprocessor relays.
The theory and application of these protective devices is an important
part of the education of an electrical engineer who specializes in power
systems. The need to act quickly to protect circuits and equipment as
well as the general public often requires protective relays to respond and
trip a breaker within a few thousandths of a second. In these cases it is
critical that the protective relays are properly maintained and regularly
tested.
Contents
1 Operation principles
2 Types according to construction
2.1 Electromechanical
2.2 Induction disc overcurrent relay
2.3 Static
2.4 Digital
2.5 Numerical
3 Relays by functions
3.1 Over current relay
3.2 Distance relay
3.3 Current differential protection
3.4 Directional relay
3.5 Synchronism check
4 References
Operation principles
Electromechanical protective relays operate by either magnetic attraction, or magnetic induction. Unlike switching
type electromechanical relays with fixed and usually ill-defined operating voltage thresholds and operating times,
protective relays have well-established, selectable and adjustable time/current (or other operating parameter)
operating characteristics. Protection relays may use arrays of induction disks, shaded-pole magnets, operating and
restraint coils, solenoid-type operators, telephone-relay contacts, and phase-shifting networks.
Protective relays can also be classified by the type of measurement they make. A protective relay may respond to
the magnitude of a quantity such as voltage or current. Induction types of relay can respond to the product of two
quantities in two field coils, which could for example represent the power in a circuit. Although an electromechanical
relay calculating the ratio of two quantities is not practical, the same effect can be obtained by a balance between
two operating coils, which can be arranged to effectively give the same result.
[1]
Several operating coils can be used to provide "bias" to the relay, allowing the sensitivity of response in one circuit
to be controlled by another. Various combinations of "operate torque" and "restraint torque" can be produced in the
relay.
By use of a permanent magnet in the magnetic circuit, a relay can be made to respond to current in one direction
differently from in another. Such polarized relays are used on direct-current circuits to detect, for example, reverse
current into a generator. These relays can be made bistable, maintaining a contact closed with no coil current and
requiring reverse current to reset. For AC circuits, the principle is extended with a polarizing winding connected to
a reference voltage source.
Light weight contacts make for sensitive relays that operate quickly, but small contacts can't carry or break heavy
currents. Often auxiliary telephone-type armature relays are triggered by the measuring relay.
In a large installation of electromechanical relays, it would be difficult to determine which device originated the signal
that tripped the circuit. This information is useful to operating personnel to determine the likely cause of the fault and
to prevent its re-occurrence. Relays may be fitted with a "target" or "flag" unit, which is released when the relay
operates, to display a distinctive colored signal when the relay has tripped.
[1]
Types according to construction
Electromechanical
Electromechanical relays can be classified into several different types as follows:
attracted armature
moving coil
induction
motor operated
mechanical
thermal
"Armature"-type relays have a pivoted lever supported on a hinge or knife-edge pivot, which carries a moving
contact. These relays may work on either alternating or direct current, but for alternating current, a shading coil on
the pole is used to maintain contact force throughout the alternating current cycle. Because the air gap between the
fixed coil and the moving armature becomes much smaller when the relay has operated, the current required to
maintain the relay closed is much smaller than the current to first operate it. The "returning ratio" or "differential" is
the measure of how much the current must be reduced to reset the relay.
A variant application of the attraction principle is the plunger-type or solenoid operator. A reed relay is another
example of the attraction principle.
"Moving coil" meters use a loop of wire turns in a stationary magnet, similar to a galvanometer but with a contact
lever instead of a pointer. These can be made with very high sensitivity. Another type of moving coil suspends the
coil from two conductive ligaments, allowing very long travel of the coil.
Induction disc overcurrent relay
"Induction" disk meters work by inducing currents in a disk that is free to rotate; the rotary motion of the disk
operates a contact. Induction relays require alternating current; if two or more coils are used, they must be at the
same frequency otherwise no net operating force is produced.
[1]
These electromagnetic relays use the induction
principle discovered by Galileo Ferraris in the late 19th century. The magnetic system in induction disc overcurrent
relays is designed to detect overcurrents in a power system and operate with a pre-determined time delay when
certain overcurrent limits have been reached. In order to operate, the magnetic system in the relays produces torque
that acts on a metal disc to make contact, according to the following basic current/torque equation:
Where
is a constant and are the two fluxes is the phase angle between the fluxes
The relay's primary winding is supplied from the power systems current transformer via a plug bridge, which is
called the plug setting multiplier (psm). Usually seven equally spaced tappings or operating bands determine the
relays sensitivity. The primary winding is located on the upper electromagnet. The secondary winding has
connections on the upper electromagnet that are energised from the primary winding and connected to the lower
electromagnet. Once the upper and lower electromagnets are energised they produce eddy currents that are
induced onto the metal disc and flow through the flux paths. This relationship of eddy currents and fluxes creates
torque proportional to the input current of the primary winding, due to the two flux paths being out of phase by 90.
In an overcurrent condition, a value of current will be reached that overcomes the control spring pressure on the
spindle and the braking magnet, causing the metal disc to rotate towards the fixed contact. This initial movement of
the disc is also held off to a critical positive value of current by small slots that are often cut into the side of the disc.
The time taken for rotation to make the contacts is not only dependent on current but also the spindle backstop
position, known as the time multiplier (tm). The time multiplier is divided into 10 linear divisions of the full rotation
time.
Providing the relay is free from dirt, the metal disc and the spindle with its contact will reach the fixed contact, thus
sending a signal to trip and isolate the circuit, within its designed time and current specifications. Drop off current of
the relay is much lower than its operating value, and once reached the relay will be reset in a reverse motion by the
pressure of the control spring governed by the braking magnet.
Static
A microprocessor-based digital
protection relay can replace the
functions of many discrete
electromechanical instruments
Application of electronic amplifiers to protective relays was described as early as 1928, using vacuum tube
amplifiers. Devices using electron tubes were studied but never applied as commercial products, because of the
limitatons of vacuum tube amplifiers. A relatively large standby current is required to maintain the tube filament
temperature; inconvenient high voltages are required for the circuits, and vacuum tube amplifiers had difficulty with
incorrect operation due to noise disturbances.
[2]
Static relays with no or few moving parts became practical with the introduction of the transistor. Static relays offer
the advantage of higher sensitivity than purely electromechanical relays, because power to operate output contacts
is derived from a separate supply, not from the signal circuits. Static relays eliminated or reduced contact bounce,
and could provide fast operation, long life and low maintenance.
Digital
The functions of electromechanical protection systems are now being replaced by microprocessor-based digital
protective relays, sometimes called "numeric relays".
These convert voltage and currents to digital form and process the
resulting measurements using a microprocessor. The digital relay can
emulate functions of many discrete electromechanical relays in one
device, simplifying protection design and maintenance. Each digital relay
can run self-test routines to confirm its readiness and alarm if a fault is
detected. Numeric relays can also provide functions such as
communications (SCADA) interface, monitoring of contact inputs,
metering, waveform analysis, and other useful features. Digital relays can,
for example, store two sets of protection parameters, which allows the
behavior of the relay to be changed during maintenance of attached
equipment. Digital relays also can provide protection strategies
impossible to synthesize with electromechanical relays, and offer benefits
in self-testing and communication to supervisory control systems.
Numerical
The distinction between digital and numerical relay rests on points of fine
technical detail, and is rarely found in areas other than Protection. They
can be viewed as natural developments of digital relays as a result of
advances in technology. Typically, they use a specialized digital signal
processor (DSP) as the computational hardware, together with the
associated software tools. The input analogue signals are converted into a
digital representation and processed according to the appropriate mathematical algorithm. Processing is carried out
using a specialized microprocessor that is optimized for signal processing applications, known as a digital signal
processor or DSP for short. Digital processing of signals in real time requires a very high power microprocessor.
[3]
Relays by functions
The various protective functions available on a given relay are denoted by standard ANSI Device Numbers. For
example, a relay including function 51 would be a timed overcurrent protective relay.
Over current relay
A digital over current relay is a type of protective relay which operates when the load current exceeds a preset
value. The ANSI device number is 50 for an instantaneous over current (IOC) and 51 for a time over current
(TOC). In a typical application the over current relay is connected to a current transformer and calibrated to
operate at or above a specific current level. When the relay operates, one or more contacts will operate and
energize to trip (open) a circuit breaker.
Distance relay
The most common form of protection on high voltage transmission systems is distance relay protection. Power lines
have set impedance per kilometre and using this value and comparing voltage and current the distance to a fault can
be determined. The ANSI standard device number for a distance relay is 21.It is also called as the impedance relay
as it calculates the line fault with the use of the impedance per meter of the transmission line
There are many types of distance relays including impedance distance, reactance distance, offset distance and
mho distance.
[4]
Current differential protection
Another common form of protection for apparatus such as transformers, generators, busses and power lines is
current differential. This type of protection works on the basic theory of Kirchhoff's current law, which states that
the sum of the currents entering and exiting a node will equal zero. Differential protection requires a set of current
transformers (smaller transformers that transform currents down to a level which can be measured) at each end of
the power line, or each side of the transformer. The current protection relay then compares the currents and
calculates the difference between the two.
As an example, a power line from one substation to another will have a current differential relay at both substations
which communicate with each other. In a healthy condition, the relay at substation A may read 500 amps (power
exporting) and substation B will read 500 amps (power importing). If a path to earth or ground develops there will
be a surge of current. As supply grids are generally well interconnected the fault in the previous example will be fed
from both ends of the power line. The relay at substation A will see a massive increase in current and will continue
to export. Substation B will also see a massive increase in current, however it will now start to export as well. In
turn the protection relay will see the currents traveling in opposite directions (180 degrees phase shift) and instead
of cancelling each other out to give a summation of zero it will see a large value of current. The relays will trip the
associated circuit breakers. This type of protection is called unit protection, as it only protects what is between the
current transformers. It is important to note that generally the higher the currents in the lines the larger the differential
current required for the relay to see it as a fault. This is basically done due to small mismatches in current
transformers. Small errors will increase as current increases to the point where the error could cause a false trip if
the current differential relay only had an upper limit instead of the rising differential characteristic. It is also important
to note that CTs have a point where the core saturates and the current in the CT is no longer proportional to the
current in the line. A CT can become inaccurate or even saturate because of a fault outside of its protected zone
(through fault) where the CTs see a large magnitude but still in the same direction.
Directional relay
Wikimedia Commons has
media related to Protective
Relays.
A directional relay uses an additional polarizing source of voltage or current to determine the direction of a fault.
The fault can be located upstream or downstream of the relay's location, allowing appropriate protective devices to
be operated inside or outside of the zone of protection.
Synchronism check
A synchronism checking relay provides a contact closure when the frequency and phase of two sources are similar
to within some tolerance margin. A "synch check" relay is often applied where two power systems are
interconnected, such as at a switchyard connecting two power grids, or at a generator circuit breaker to ensure the
generator is synchronized to the system before connecting it.
References
1. ^
a

b

c
Protective Relays Application Guide 3rd Edition, GEC Alsthom Measurements Ltd. 1987, no ISBN, pages
9-10, 83-93
2. ^ T. S. Madhava Rao,Power system protection: static relays with microprocessor applications , Tata McGraw-Hill,
1989, ISBN 0-07-460307-8, pp 1-2,
3. ^ Li Tan & Jean Jiang,Digital Signal Processing: Fundamentals and Applications, Academic Press; 2nd Edition,
2013, ISBN 0-12-415893-5, pp 405-452,
4. ^ Elmore 2003, p. 247.
C. Russel Mason, The Art and Science of Protective Relaying,
General Electric, available at [1]
(http://www.gedigitalenergy.com/multilin/notes/artsci/index.htm)
Elmore, W.A. (2003). Protective Relaying: Theory and Applications (http://books.google.com/books?
id=1Jqhpd-rhoUC&pg=PA247). Taylor & Francis. ISBN 9780824709723. Retrieved 2014-01-17.
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Categories: Relay switches
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