Dictionary of Electrical Engineering

Commonly used terms in the Electrical industry.

dual-element fuse
a fuse constructed with two different types of fusible elements in series. One element is designed to melt very quickly in the presence of fault current. The other is designed to melt after a time delay when exposed to overload conditions. The fusible elements are somewhat similar in operation to the thermal and magnetic elements of an inverse-time circuit breaker. Dual-element and time-delay are often used interchangeably.