[Mgs] Fuses

Hans Duinhoven h.duinhoven at planet.nl
Fri Oct 8 13:37:18 MDT 2010


32V fuses were typically used on the low voltage circuits of the Data 
General computers, where I once was a support engineer. Appears to me as a 
typical USA standard low voltage fuse, not to be used in higher voltages 
like 110 V in the USA, or even the 230 - V in Europe....

Cheers,

Hans

71 BGT

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Paul Hunt" <paul.hunt1 at blueyonder.co.uk>
To: "Steven Trovato" <strovato at optonline.net>
Cc: <mgs at autox.team.net>
Sent: Friday, October 08, 2010 10:13 AM
Subject: Re: [Mgs] Fuses


> Perfectly understandable, but the fuse wire in these is over an inch long, 
> even 20kV or so from the ignition coil couldn't jump the end caps or even 
> keep an arc going.  I've got fuses labelled 250v which are less than half 
> that length.  The lowest voltage quoted on that site is 125 volts (and the 
> others are all round numbers), also quite reasonable.  32 volts is a 
> ridiculously low voltage to quote for those fuses, as well as being a very 
> odd value. Blade fuses have the same rating even though the spades are 
> much closer together.  It seems to me that someone has labelled all 
> automotive fuses as '32 volt' which is perhaps nothing more than a typical 
> maximum of 24v plus a safety factor, without any regard to what they are 
> actually safe at.  None of my fuses show a voltage rating, only a current 
> rating.  The upshot is that you can fit any fuse of the correct physical 
> dimensions *and current rating* regardless of its notional voltage rating.
>
> PaulH.
>
> ----- Original Message ----- 
>> The voltage rating of the fuse must be greater than or equal to the 
>> circuit voltage.  Because the fuse has such low resistance, the voltage 
>> rating becomes critical only when the fuse is trying to open.  The fuse 
>> must be able to open quickly, extinguish the arc after the fuse element 
>> has melted and prevent the system open-circuit voltage from restriking 
>> across the open fuse element.


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