Modeling Moving Electric Arcs: Verification of a Coupled Fluid-Dynamics Magnetostatic Approach

A numerical model describing arc motion driven by the magnetic self-blast field is presented. It is similar to standard miniature circuit breaker configurations. The transient problem is solved by coupling fluid-dynamics software with a Whitney element-based electrodynamics code, a Biot-Savart law-based magnetic solver, and a simulated supply circuit. Volumetric source terms in the plasmatic fluids momentum and energy equation are coupled using an implicit approach. Improvements of earlier numerical techniques are described. Simulation results are compared to experimental data.