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Re: [Mgs] Fuses

To: mgs@autox.team.net
Subject: Re: [Mgs] Fuses
From: Steven Trovato <strovato@optonline.net>
Date: Thu, 07 Oct 2010 11:13:02 -0400
I think that 32V on an automotive fuse does mean 32 Volt.  It is not 
an uncommon thing to find on an automotive fuse, in the United 
States, anyway.  It doesn't mean that it expects your car to run 32 
Volts.  It just means that the fuse is rated to function and be safe 
at up to 32 volts.  It's like having 112 mph speed rated 
tires.  They're safe up to 112 mph under specified conditions, but 
you are not required to drive 112 mph.

While we're on the subject of fuses, I think there is a lot of 
confusion about the concept of "slow-blow" fuses.  If you stick a 
thin piece of wire in a fuse, at a certain current it will melt and 
open the circuit.  If you coil that thin piece of wire around a 
ceramic core, it will still melt at the same current, but the 
temperature will rise more slowly because of the heat being absorbed 
by the core.  This is the concept behind the slow-blow 
fuse.  (Implementation details may vary.)  Some types of equipment, 
like electric motors, draw more current when they are starting up 
than during continuous operation.  The slow-blow fuse is sometimes 
specified in such applications.

None of this has anything to do with the fact that the British rate 
fuses using a different system than Americans.  A regular style fuse 
might be sold with a different amperage designation in England than 
in the US, but that in and of itself does not make it a "slow-blow" 
fuse.  The speed of a fuse is an actual engineered parameter, and it 
is different from the nomenclature issue that arises from different 
countries using different rating systems.

-Steve Trovato
strovato@optonline.net

At 03:54 AM 10/7/2010, Paul Hunt wrote:
>Highly unlikely that an automotive fuse would say '32v' where the 
>'v' means 'volts', if that is really what it does read then it 
>almost certainly is some kind of part number.
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