Overcurrent Protection System Using Microcontroller
Overcurrent Protection System Using Microcontroller
Guided By
Dr. Yogesh Kumar Nayak
I. Abstract ………………………………………………………. 01
II. Introduction …………………………………………………... 01
III. Solution Methodology ………………………………….......... 02-05
IV. Working ……………………………………………………… 06-08
V. Result ………………………………………………………… 08
VI. Conclusion …………………………………………………… 09
VII. Future Scope …………………………………………………. 09
VIII. References …………………………………………………… 10
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1. Abstract:
systems for simple electrical circuitries for both academic and commercial usage. In this project
we have to propose and implement a prototype overvoltage and overcurrent protection scheme
of single phase two terminal passive circuits utilizing the Arduino Uno microcontroller and the
Arduino Software (IDE). The proposed scheme would acquire and process conditioned analog
input values of voltage and current of a system in real time and the implemented Arduino
programmes would monitor whether those values exceed a predefined threshold; exceeding
that will trip a relay to protect the system. The scheme would have three major segments that
are the current sensing segment, the voltage sensing segment and the relay module and these
segments shall be properly interfaced with the Arduino Uno Microcontroller and the load. The
scheme is tested on a resistive and a lamp load and an analysis of the obtained data through
experimentation on these electrical loads suggest that the proposed scheme is essentially
2. Introduction:
Electrical circuitries with the addition of electronic components have become more complex
in nature and anomalies might arise due to even very slight fluctuations in the circuit
parameters. The successful and efficient operation of these circuitries is often attributed to the
relays and switchgears that monitor the anomalies in various parameters of the system and
isolate the faulty segments from the normal to ensure that the equipment is properly protected.
desirable to offer ample protection to the elementary circuitries & costly equipment that are
used for various purposes. Any aberration in the parameters of these circuitries can result in
instability in voltage and current levels and it may be detrimental to the equipment in use &
supply lines. In this decade with the accelerating developments in engineering & technology,
it has become imperative to analyse, monitor and synthesize numerical values of various
intrinsic parameters of different complex systems in order to ensure the optimal and reliable
functionality of those. Arduino Uno microcontroller board can be utilized to devise a form of
digital relay with Arduino programming for real time protection of single & poly phase AC &
DC systems.
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When a fault occurs, a current or voltage many times higher the ‘rated’ value is encountered
which in turn harms lifetime of electrical machines or appliances and causes interruption of
services consequence. Reports of fire in home structure is found to be factored to 55,000 from
45,000 incidents since 2000, where the incidents account for death, injuries and almost Rs.10
billion worth directly involved property damage between 2007 and 2012 alone.
3. Solution Methodology:
Due to these problem statements a lot of money and life damage occurs every year. So,to
prevent this we use a overcurrent relay using Arduino UNO microcontroller and the Arduino
software(IDE) which is auto-resettable i.e. doesn’t need of any manual operation all functions
are donned automatically and we also used a siren to indicate that overcurrent fault occurred.
3.1 Arduino:
Arduino is open-source hardware. The hardware reference designs are distributed under
a Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 2.5 license and are available on the Arduino
website. Layout and production files for some versions of the hardware are also available.
Although the hardware and software designs are freely available under copyleft licenses
the developers have requested the name Arduino to be exclusive to the official product and not
be used for derived works without permission. The official policy document on use of the
Arduino name emphasizes that the project is open to incorporating work by others into the
official product. Several Arduino-compatible products commercially released have avoided the
An early Arduino board with an RS-232 serial interface (upper left) and an Atmel
ATmega8 microcontroller chip (black, lower right); the 14 digital I/O pins are at the top, the 6
analog input pins at the lower right, and the power connector at the lower left.
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[Fig (1): Arduino description]
3.1.1 USB:
The USB port is used to power the board from the computer's USB port and also to transfer the
It is used to power the board if the USB connector is not used. An AC adapter (9 volts,2.1mm
barrel tip, centre positive) could be used for providing external power. If there is no power at
the power socket, then the Arduino will use power form the USB socket. But it is safe to have
The Arduino Uno has 14 digital pins (0 to 13) of which the 6 are PWM (~). This pin can be
either inputs or outputs. But we need to mention it in the Arduino sketch (Arduino
programming). The PWM (Pulse Width Modulated) pins acts as normal digital pins and also
used to control some functions. Say for example, control the dimming of LED and control the
direction of servo motor. Both digital inputs and digital outputs can read one of the two values
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The Analog pins (0 to 5) acts as inputs which is used to read the voltage in analog sensors such
as temperature sensor, gas sensor, etc. Unlike digital pins which can only read one of the two
values (HIGH or LOW), the analog inputs can measure 1024 different voltage levels.
Atmel. This chip works well with Arduino IDE. If damaged, this controller can be easily
replaced. The Atmega328 has 32 KB of flash memory for storing code (of which 0,5 KB is
3.1.7 5V Pin:
The regulated power supply used to power the microcontroller and other components on the
board. This can come either from an on-board regulator, or be supplied by USB or another
regulated 5V supply.
It is used to reset the microcontroller. Pushing this button will temporarily connect the reset
pin to ground and restart any code that is loaded on the Arduino.
The relay driver is design by using a BC547 transistor. The relay used here having the
specification as follows
Coil voltage=12Vdc
Contact capacity=230V, 7A
The above specification indicates that the coil requires 12V dc and 200mA current dc. The
Microcontroller can’t supply more then 10mA current. So, driver section is very much required.
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BC547 has a typical current gain of 200 and maximum current capacity of 1A. So, a typical
These are very much reliable devices and widely used on field. The operating frequency of
these devices are minimum 10-20ms.That is 50Hz – 100Hz.The relay which is used here
can care 25mA currents continuously. The electromagnetic relay operates on the principle
magnetism. When the base voltage appears at the relay driver section, the driver transistor
will be driver transistor will be driven into saturation and allow to flow current in the coil of
the relay, Which in turn create a magnetic field and the magnetic force produced due to that
will act against the spring tension and close the contact coil. Whenever the base voltage is
withdrawn the transistor goes to cutoff. So, no current flow in the coil of the relay. Hence
the magnetic field disappears so the contact point breaks automatically due to spring
tension. Those contact points are isolated from the low voltage supply, so a high voltage
10uF
1.5K
BC547
DATA
INPUT
IN 4007
RELAY SPDT
VCC
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A Step-Down Transformer is a device which converts high primary voltage to a low secondary
voltage. In a Step-Down Transformer, the primary winding of a coil has more turns than the
secondary winding.
3.4 Rectifier:
Diodes are widely used semiconductor device. A rectifier diode is a two-lead semiconductor
that allows current to pass in only one direction. Generally, P-N junction is formed by joining
together n-type and p-type semiconductor materials. The P-type side is called the anode and
the n-type side is called the cathode. Many types of diodes are used for a wide range of
applications. Rectifier diodes are a vital component in power supplies where they are used to
A voltage regulated ICs one of the most widely used electronic circuitry in any device. A
regulated voltage (without fluctuations & noise levels) is very important for the smooth
functioning of many digital electronic devices. A common case is with micro controllers, where
a smooth regulated input voltage must be supplied for the micro controller to function
smoothly. We have used here two types of ICs i.e. 7805 and 7812.
3.6 Capacitor: Capacitor used here for filtering the pulsating DC output of rectifier bridge
to pure DC.
3.7 LED: LEDs are used here to indicate whether current is coming to ICs or not and for
this purpose two resistors are also connected in series with the LEDs.
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4. Working:
When ac signal is given to the primary of the transformer, due to the magnetic effect of the coil
magnetic flux is induced in the coil(primary) and transfer to the secondary coil of the
which transformer electrical energy from one coil to another without changing its frequency”.
Here the diodes are connected in a bridge fashion. The secondary coil of the transformer is
During the +ve cycle of the ac signal the diodes D2 & D4 conduct due to the forward
bias of the diodes and diodes D1 & D3 does not conduct due to the reversed bias of the diodes.
Similarly, during the –ve cycle of the ac signal the diodes D1 & D3 conduct due to the forward
bias of the diodes and the diodes D2 & D4 does not conduct due to reversed bias of the diodes.
The output of the bridge rectifier is not a power dc along with rippled ac is also present. To
overcome this effect, a capacitor is connected to the o/p of the diodes (D2 & D3). Which
removes the unwanted ac signal and thus a pure dc is obtained. Here we need a fixed voltage,
that’s for we are using IC regulators (7805 & 7812).” Voltage regulation is a circuit that
supplies a constant voltage regardless of changes in load current.” This IC’s are designed as
fixed voltage regulators and with adequate heat sinking can deliver output current in excess of
1A. The o/p of the bridge rectifier is given as input to the IC regulator through capacitor with
respect to GND and thus a fixed o/p is obtained. The o/p of the IC regulator (7805 & 7812) is
given to the LED for indication purpose through resistor. Due to the forward bias of the LED,
the LED glows ON state, and the o/p are obtained from the pin no-3.
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int oc = A0;
void setup() {
pinMode(redLed, OUTPUT);
pinMode(greenLed, OUTPUT);
pinMode(oc, INPUT);
Serial.begin(9600);
}
void loop() {
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Serial.println(analogSensor);
delay(200);
if (analogSensor >=420)
digitalWrite(redLed, HIGH);
digitalWrite(greenLed, LOW);
else
digitalWrite(redLed, LOW);
digitalWrite(greenLed, HIGH);
delay(100);
5. Result:
In our project we were protected the load home appliances (here lamp load) when overcurrent
occurs. When overcurrent flows the lamp connected with the current sensor which it senses the
signal and a siren (here a bulb load) is connected which alerts i.e. alarms and the relay is
connected with the Arduino was tripped and hence this shows the light bulb load or home
appliances were get protected by the overcurrent. A photograph of the circuit after the
[Fig(6):Project kit]
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6. Conclusion:
An overcurrent relay was designed using Arduino Uno microcontroller. Thus, the proposed
prototype protection system has been devised and implement to trip the load elements
successfully at different overcurrent conditions within a margin of error that might further be
This scheme is simple, moderately sensitive and reliable and may further be improved
based upon this prototype to implement overcurrent protection simultaneously and improve the
simplicity and efficiency of it. It can also be extended and reprogrammed to offer further
protection schemes such as undervoltage, undercurrent and earth fault protections and could
offer protection to single phase AC motors and other electrical machineries. It can also be
devised and programmed to offer comprehensive protection to three phase systems and it may
7. Future Scope:
phase system.
8. References:
modern NPR for over current protection with the application of microcontroller technology in
power system,” International journal of Eng. Research and development, vol. 10, no. 3,2014.
[2] A. Rafa, S. Mahmod, N. Mariun, W. Z. Wan Hassan, and N.F. Malilah, “protection of
power transformer using Microcontroller based relay ” IEEE Proc. Student Conference on
https://www.nfpa.org/news-and-research/fire-statistics-and-reports/fire-statistics/fire-
[4] Griffin, C.H., and Pope, J.W., “Generator Ground Fault Protection Using Over-Current
Overvoltage, and Undervoltage Relays” IEEE Transactions on Power app. Systems vol. PAS
[5] Bhat, Aakanksha, Snigdha Srivastava Swarnim, Shivani Verma, and G. V. Ramanarao.
Companies, 2012.
[7] Bayle, Julien. C programming for Arduino. Packt Publishing Ltd., 2013.
Myths and reality." Serbian Journal of Electrical Engineering 6, no. 1 (2009): 167-186
Figure:
[1] https://www.elprocus.com/what-is-arduino-uno-r3-pin-diagram-specification-and-applications/
[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSHVg9Cdg1s
Guide signature:-
Contents:
……………………………………………………… 06-08
XII. Result ………………………………………………………… 08
XIII. Conclusion …………………………………………………… 09
XIV. Future Scope …………………………………………………. 09
XV. References …………………………………………………… 10