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Joined: Nov 2002
Posts: 794
Likes: 3
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wa2ise Offline OP
Member
Found a link to an mpg of a short video of a arc and firey failure of a transformer in a power substation. http://205.243.100.155/frames/mpg/XfrmBlast1.mpg

Joined: Jul 2002
Posts: 8,443
Likes: 3
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Wow!!,
Thanks for the pic, mate!.
Pretty impressive, any idea where this is or what size Xformer it is?.
Haven't seen anything like that, since we(the fire brigade) turned up at the Winslow sub-station(110kV)when it went on fire and we wondered how the h**l we were going to turn the power off, let alone put it out!. [Linked Image]

[This message has been edited by Trumpy (edited 04-25-2003).]

Joined: Jul 2002
Posts: 22
C
Member
To the best of my memory this was a Capacitor Bank fire.

Chris

Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 2,527
B
Moderator
Regardless of what "they" say, this was a flying-saucer crash in Oregon.

Proof is the trace of purple in the smoke cloud in the last few frames when the gammatron antimatter-containment orb ruptured.

Isn't the internet great? ;-)

Joined: Oct 2001
Posts: 31
F
Member
probably somebodys 1 iron that was thrown out of anger got across the lines

Joined: Feb 2003
Posts: 368
M
Member
got this back from one of my distribution tech friends after I sent this thread to him.

"Got the lowdown on that transformer fire. Ends up this was Florida Light and Power station. What happened (incredibly) was there was a phase to phase fault on the station bus and the protection wouldn't work because the fuse clip on the English Electric fuse was broken (a very common problem).

The fluid you see before the major fire is actually the insulating oil in the transformer because the arc actually burnt through the side of the transformer.

The next day FP&L technicians went out and checked all fuse clips, finding some 20% of all fuse clips broken. At present English Electric will not sell the fuse clips to any of their previous customers since they cannot
guarantee they will be installed correctly (they cost $4/pair) but will instead will sell the whole fuse holder (for $30)."

Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 745
M
Member
mbhydro:
Thanks for the additional information on this spectacular failure. It must have literally scared the $(^*$(*% out of the people who were fortunate (or unfortunate...?) to be eye witnesses [Linked Image]. I'm curious about something...shortly after the insulating oil erupts from the transformer and ignites, there is a very bright flash and explosion, after which the "humming" stops. Can you identify (or speculate) what happened at this point in this event?

This is quite a piece of video...I've watched it more times than my wife has watched "Gone With the Wind" [Linked Image]. Much more exciting...

Mike (mamills)

Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 4,116
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Great Video!

Here's some stills from it for the "Mpeg-challenged" out there:

[Linked Image]

[Linked Image]

(Mike, I think this is the blast that you are referring to)

Bill

ps > will probably move this into the photos submitted area.


Bill
Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 745
M
Member
Bill:
That's it!! Sounds almost like the whole top of the transformer blew off [Linked Image]. (it really sounds great if you turn the volume on your speakers all the way up!)

Mike (mamills)

[This message has been edited by mamills (edited 05-21-2003).]

Joined: Mar 2003
Posts: 36
U
Member
Found the same video on another website, themeterguy.com, Also found a couple of similarly neat high voltage problems. This link: http://www.themeterguy.com/photogallery/BoomTruckinPowerLines.wmv

is what happens when your sign crane or boom truck comes into contact with the primary lines on the pole line in front of your new building. I believe the diesel engine you hear idling in the background is the fire engine just standing back until the power gets shut off.

The next one is a Joslyn 3 pole air break switch opening up the bushings on a transfrmer or circuit breaker:
http://www.themeterguy.com/Joslyn.mpg

Enjoy.

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