Visual Inspection: A Necessary Component of Infrared Inspections

Visual inspections are a very valuable by-product of an infrared (IR)  survey of electrical switchgear. Many electrical panel interiors have not seen the light of day since installation. Since one must remove the panel covers in order to do a proper survey, when they are opened during an IR inspection, two opportunities present themselves: The infrared inspection and the visual inspection.

1. The infrared inspection: The reason for performing this type of survey is to find electrical problems so maintenance personnel can repair them before failure and/or damage to the component and the resulting downtime. Many times, critical problems are obvious and other times they are not so obvious without some due diligence.
2. The visual inspection: Visual inspection can be just as important as infrared. There are many things visually that can’t be detected with infrared as the examples in this article demonstrate.

It may seem that visual inspection goes beyond what thermographers are hired to do, but conscientious thermographers include notes and even images in their reports when they see code violations, broken equipment, incorrectly sized fuses, bad wiring, etc. Whether the inspection is insurance driven or a proactive stance, an infrared inspection and a visual inspection complement each other