Patent ID: 8139336

Claim:
A circuit breaker apparatus, comprising: a trip mechanism which is coupled to an electrical circuit and which is configured to interrupt an operation of the electrical circuit when the trip mechanism is actuated; an electronic trip unit disposed in signal communication with and configured to actuate the trip mechanism when pre-selected conditions are satisfied; a rating plug coupled to the electronic trip unit and configured to operate in a first mode in response to a receipt of one or more transmitted control signals at the rating plug, and to otherwise operate in a second mode, the first and second modes being respectively associated with first and second ones of the pre-selected conditions to be correspondingly transmitted to the electronic trip unit by which the electronic trip unit determines whether to actuate the trip mechanism; and a programming unit which is configured to transmit each of the one or more control signals to the rating plug such that the rating plug operates in the first mode when the programming unit is disposed in signal communication with the rating plug.