Standards
The standards a busbar sleeve is tested to
Fifteen references appear across this range. One describes the switchgear, one sets the bare-bar baseline, and the other thirteen were run on a moulded specimen.
Take the standards list off any datasheet in this range and it sorts into three groups doing three different jobs. ANSI C37.20.2 describes the switchgear the part is offered for. IEC 71-2 supplies the bare-conductor clearances the insulated figures are quoted against. The remaining thirteen — nine ASTM methods, IEC 216, IEC 60684-2, ESI 09-11 and UL 94 — are bench tests on a laboratory specimen.
Only that third group was measured on the material being bought.
The lists also differ from part to part, and two sit behind no property table. The end cap and the bus sheet name standards on the page but publish a value against only some, so a clause written against either needs the sheet asked for by name.
ANSI C37.20.2 covers the switchgear, not the covering
ANSI C37.20.2 is the standard for metal-clad switchgear. It governs how the cubicle is built, compartmented and proved. No clause in it is one a busbar covering passes or fails on its own.
So every voltage on this site is an application claim. A part offered as meeting ANSI C37.20.2 for switchgear application to 36 kV is offered for use inside switchgear of that class. It is not a withstand result for the covering and not a type test of the panel.
The reference is not universal across the range either. It is named on the BUSTUBE sleeve, the GEHB 66 kV series, the PVC shroud, the end cap and the bus sheet, and not on the polyolefin shroud's page or the GBBS board's. So the polyolefin-for-PVC swap that looks like a straight material substitution is the one that quietly drops it.
IEC 71-2 owns the baseline, not the saving
The clearance table on the sleeve datasheet carries one column headed as uninsulated busbars to IEC 71-2: 120 mm at 12 kV, 160 mm at 17.5 kV, 220 mm at 24 kV, 320 mm at 36 kV. Every reduction claimed on this site is subtracted from those four numbers.
IEC 71-2 is an insulation co-ordination application guide, concerned with air and withstand levels. No part of it was tested on a polymer, and the reduced columns printed beside it are the manufacturer's own figures with no IEC status.
That split decides who holds the evidence. The bare column is a published standard the approving authority already has. The reduced column is supplier data, supported by the datasheet plus whatever the panel's own type test proves. The millimetres are on busbar air clearance.
IEC 216 states endurance, not survival
Every continuous temperature limit here is referred to IEC 216: -40°C to +115°C on the polyolefin sleeve and shroud, -20°C to +115°C on the PVC shroud, -40°C to +105°C on the bus sheet, -45°C to +105°C on the barrier board.
IEC 216 is a thermal-endurance method. It ages specimens at several elevated temperatures, measures a chosen property after each, and reports the temperature at which that property still holds for a stated period. The band is a limit for continuous duty, not a short-term survival rating.
One entry in that column does not belong to it. The polyolefin shroud tabulates a 125°C shrink temperature against IEC 216 in the same table, and a recovery temperature is a processing figure. Reproduced here as published; confirm the method before it enters a clause.
The ASTM D-series, one line each
- ASTM D149 — dielectric strength
- Voltage a specimen holds off per millimetre before it punctures: 22 kV/mm minimum on cross-linked polyolefin, 20 kV/mm on GBBS board, 16 kV/mm on flexible PVC. Multiplying it by a wall does not give the part a rated voltage.
- ASTM D150 — dielectric constant
- Charge stored in an alternating field, quoted as 5 maximum on both polyolefin parts. It governs how field distributes around the covering, not whether the covering holds.
- ASTM D257 — volume resistivity
- Leakage through the bulk rather than across the surface. 1 x 10^13 ohm.cm minimum on the polyolefin shroud, 1 x 10^14 on the board — a decade apart, both far above a panel's leakage budget.
- ASTM D570 — water absorption
- Mass gained on immersion for a fixed period, held to 0.5% maximum on the polyolefin shroud and the board. This is the row that speaks to a damp cabinet.
- ASTM D638 — tensile strength and ultimate elongation
- A dumb-bell specimen pulled to break. Tensile 9 N/mm² minimum on the polyolefin shroud, 10 on the board, 12 on PVC; elongation 300% on the shroud, 350% on the other two. Elongation is the figure that falls with age.
- ASTM D792 — density
- 1.20 ± 0.2 gm/cm³ on the board, 1.23 gm/cm³ on PVC. It identifies which compound was supplied and decides nothing else.
- ASTM D2240 — hardness
- Indentation resistance: 45 ± 10 Shore D on the polyolefin shroud, 40 ± 5 Shore D on the board, 65 ± 5 Shore A on PVC. Two scales, so the three cannot be ranked against each other.
- ASTM D2303 — tracking and erosion
- A specimen held at an angle under voltage with contaminant running down it, checked for a carbonised path and for material loss. The recorded result across this range is a clean run at 3.25 kV over twenty minutes.
- ASTM D2671 — accelerated ageing and low-temperature flexibility
- One method, two checks. The board's ageing criterion is the only quantified degradation limit published here: seven days at 90°C with tensile and elongation both inside a ±25% variation. The cold check is four hours at -40°C.
Which standard is named on which part
| Standard | BUSTUBE sleeve | BUSBOOT polyolefin | BUSBOOT PVC | GBBS board |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ANSI C37.20.2 | Yes | — | Yes | — |
| IEC 71-2 | Product page only | — | — | — |
| IEC 216 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| IEC 60684-2 | Product page only | — | — | — |
| ESI 09-11 | Yes | Yes | — | — |
| ASTM D149 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| ASTM D150 | Yes | Yes | — | Yes |
| ASTM D257 | Yes | Yes | — | Yes |
| ASTM D570 | Yes | Yes | — | Yes |
| ASTM D638 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| ASTM D792 | Yes | — | Yes | Yes |
| ASTM D2240 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| ASTM D2303 | Selection chart only | Yes | — | Yes |
| ASTM D2671 | Yes | Yes | — | Yes |
| UL 94-V0 | — | — | Yes | — |
Yes means the standard is named on that part's published pages. The sleeve is published across two, a product page and a selection chart, whose lists do not match; where they differ the cell says which carries it. IEC 60684-2 is the test-methods part of the flexible insulating sleeving series, and no published value on the sleeve page is referred to it. The fullest property table in the range is on the manufacturer's BUSBOOT Polyolefin datasheet.
ESI 09-11 is the one entry that is neither ASTM nor IEC
Heat shock: 90°C for thirty minutes, inspected for cracking and flowing. Recorded on the polyolefin shroud, named on the sleeve and the bus sheet. ESI numbers are British electricity supply industry specifications, so an approval sheet with columns for ASTM and IEC alone has nowhere to put the result. Quote it as heat shock with its temperature and duration, and the reviewer can place it.
Third-party marks, and which of them touch a busbar part
Four outside bodies appear in the manufacturer's published record. Two concern busbar; the rest are cable-accessory qualifications that get copied across anyway.
- UL File E335936, 2011, lists Busboot and Bustube. This is the file to cite where a specification asks for a UL-listed busbar cover. It is printed on the PVC shroud's sheet and not on the polyolefin one.
- UL File E328538, 2009, lists heat-shrink tubes. That is the tubing file; cited against a bar sleeve it invites a question you then have to answer.
- ERDA holds a test report specific to the busbar sleeve. A report records what one sample did on one occasion — weaker than a listing, stronger than an unwitnessed datasheet. Ask for it by report number.
- CPRI certified 33 kV heat-shrink joints and terminations in August 2012. Cable accessories, and not evidence for anything specified here.
- MSEDCL approved the manufacturer at 11 kV in 2015 and 11-33 kV in 2016. A utility vendor approval for cable accessories, again not a busbar qualification.
- ISO 9001:2015, ISO 14001:2015 and ISO 45001:2018 certify how the factory is run. None is a statement about a covering's dielectric strength.
- In-house partial-discharge, high-voltage and product-testing laboratories generate the routine figures — the maker's own, not an accredited third party, which is why the ERDA report matters. See where these parts are made and tested.
Where each of these is put to work
- Choosing between cross-linked polyolefin, PVC and rigid boardThe measured values these methods returned, three materials side by side.
- How busbar insulation fails in serviceWhich bench test predicts which failure mode, and which predicts none.
- Cutting busbar air clearance with insulationThe IEC 71-2 column in full, and what the reduced columns do to a panel.
- The sleeve that shrinks onto the barThe longest standards list in the range, across two published pages.
- BUSBOOT shroud, PVC or cross-linked polyolefinWhere the UL file number and the heat-shock row are printed, and where they are not.
Ask for a figure, not for a standard number
A list of standard numbers cannot be answered. Name the part, the property and the figure the approval turns on — dielectric strength on a GHB 100/38, the ageing criterion on GBBS-3 — and the reply can carry the sheet that holds it.
Stated limit
Nothing here qualifies an assembly. Every ASTM and IEC figure above was measured on a specimen in a laboratory, ANSI C37.20.2 describes the switchgear a part may be used in rather than the part itself, and a UL file covers the product as its maker constructs it. A material test report is not a type test. The panel carrying these parts is proved by its own test at its own phase centres.