Eaton Corporation

John Stewart Bartholomew

Neal E Rowe

William Edward Wilkie

Steven Dale Walker

Rodney William Bruner

Douglas Kim Frantz

A switchgear assembly in which a number of cells housing electrical switching apparatus such as circuit breakers are vertically stacked in a forward compartment has combined arc shield/wire trays between cells for terminating secondary wiring for easy access through front doors on the switchgear assembly and for protecting the secondary wiring from circuit breaker arc gases. The arc gases are deflected by an upwardly and rearwardly inclined panel forming the back wall of the wire tray. A vertical wall forward of the inclined panel mounts a lower horizontal row of terminal blocks forward of an upper row. A wireway has a vertical section in a forward corner of the cabinet beside the vertically stacked cells which communicates with the wire trays, and a horizontal section extending rearward under the top wall of the cabinet. An inclined gutter provides a transition between the top of the vertical section and the forward end of the horizontal section. External wiring enters the wireway either through a bottom access opening aligned with the vertical section or a top access opening in the horizontal section. A depending lip on the rear of the arc shield diverts the arc gases laterally into a vertical chamber behind the vertical section of the wireway for expansion and cooling.

Combined arc shield/wire tray for switchgear and switchgear assemblies incorporating same

Switchgear assembly with integral control wiring wireway

The cross buses extending through side-by-side cabinets in a switchgear assembly are mounted on the metal cabinet frames by supports having a molded body with a bus bar mounting surface laterally spaced from a support mounting surface to form a gap between the bus bar and the metal frame. A planar barrier inserted between the cabinets has a cutout aligned with this gap. The molded support further has a barrier surface which extends across the gap and blocks the cutout. The barrier surfaces of supports mounted on side-by-side cabinets abut and parallel flanges on the molded bodies adjacent the barrier surfaces form grooves in which the planar barrier is clamped.

Switchgear assemblies with molded support mounting bus bars extending through barriers between side-by-side cabinets

Growing community of inventors

Hendersonville, NC, United States of America

John Stewart Bartholomew