Аннотация
The article deals with the numerical simulation of pulse heating of electrical contacts in a wide temperature range up to the melting point, which is based on experimental oscillograms of the electrode current and voltage. The variation of contact spot radius is found with account of material softening. It is shown that rather a small spot expansion can cause a considerable decrease of contact temperature. Dynamics of contact spot heating is analyzed, and distributions of temperature and heat flows are plotted.