The principle is to grade the operating times of the relays in such a way that the relay closest to the fault spot operates first. The faster the protection operates, the smaller the resulting ha-zards, damage and the thermal stress will be. Core idea: Protective relays monitor electrical quantities and command protective devices to isolate faults or abnormal operating conditions.
[pdf] The development of the relay protection based on open architecture is a relevant direction of electrical and electronic engineering. The paper presents the problem of the modern microprocessor-based relay prote.
[pdf] ERS provides turnkey solutions for maintaining and testing electromechanical, solid-state, and microprocessor-based relays, as well as IEC 61850 IEDs, relay panels, and distributed protection systems. Protection systems play a key role in ensuring the safe and reliable operation of the entire electrical grid including generation, transmission, and distribution for utility and industrial applications. These devices spend years in standby mode, waiting to isolate faults in milliseconds when called upon. Protective relays are your most powerful defense against long, costly outages and extensive. Acceptance tests are performed in presence of the customer or by the customer. Installation tests are field tests to determine that the protection operates correctly in actual service.
[pdf] Instantaneous protection helps to protect equipment against phase-to-phase, phase-to-neutral and phase-to-ground short circuits. It trips without additional time delay as soon as the setting current is exceeded. This is the simplest form of overcurrent protection, both in concept and in implementation (relay design). Working Principle: When the current in an overcurrent relay exceeds a critical level, the magnetic effect of the coil activates the moving element.
[pdf] Electromechanical relays, often used for their robustness, typically last for about 100,000 to 500,000 cycles depending on operational conditions. When requirements change, the relay functionality can be easily modified or the software upgraded to extend the lifetime of the protection solution. Typically, the electrical life expectancy of general-purpose and power relays is rated at a minimum of 100,000 operations. Although failure of a protective relay system may have severe local or regional impacts, most protective relay systems are not required to operate to prove they are in working order. They are often easy to maintain and repair because replacement parts are still widely available.
[pdf] 
