Patent ID: 7352545

Claim:
A hermetic compressor having a housing and a motor compressor unit hermetically encased thereby, a terminal assembly sealed in a wall of said housing and a compressor fault interruption circuit, said fault interruption circuit comprising: a current draw sensor; a reference signal source representing a current draw threshold level that is much higher than locked rotor current; a comparison circuit connected to receive inputs from said current draw sensor and said reference signal source; and a disconnect device connected in series with and ahead of said terminal assembly and controlled by said comparison circuit, said disconnect device comprising means for rapidly disconnecting power to the terminal assembly when the input from said current draw sensor exceed the reference signal to prevent heating of the compressor terminal assembly to a level likely to cause terminal venting; wherein the reference signal corresponds to current draw that will subsequently heat the terminal assembly to a level that the differential temperature between a pin and surrounding glass of the terminal assembly exceeds a level where stresses in the glass will cause failure of the pin/glass seal.