Short Circuit Studies​

The purpose of a short-circuit study is to evaluate electrical equipment to insure that it can handle possible fault conditions.  You wouldn't splice a 1/2" plumbing line in-line into a 8" fire main, and you don't want to find that a contractor has installed a circuit breaker rated 10 KAIC (Kilo-Ampere Interrupting Rating) in your panelboard which has 22KA of available fault current.  In this example, a 3-phase fault could weld the breaker contacts shut or turn the breaker into shrapnel, just like the pressure from the fire main would blow apart the 1/2" line.   
 
The short circuit study is a critical part of the Arc Flash study because it provides the fault current at each bus (meaning at each point in the distribution system), and it also informs owners if they have components that could fail critically in this manner, and not clear the fault as designed.  It is imperative that owners replace these over-dutied (or under-rated) components in order to validate the results of the arc-flash study.              
 
Contact Blackmon Power to learn more.