Streamers and partial discharge mechanisms in silicone gel under impulse and AC voltages

Silicone gels are widely used to encapsulate power electronics modules. The objective of this paper is to study the partial discharge (PD) mechanism in a silicone gel, using electrical measurements and fast visualization. Experiments are carried out in a pointplane geometry, using either impulse voltage or ac. Under impulse voltage, the visualization shows that the first discharges recorded in a new sample are due to the initiation and propagation of "streamers", with features close to those previously reported in viscous liquids. Under ac, a stable PD regime rapidly establishes: a streamer creates a cavity with a long lifetime, and PDs occur in this cavity during the subsequent ac waves. Since slow streamers develop during long times (some ms), classical PD measurements do not provide an adequate evaluation of the actual discharge magnitude: very small PDs (1 pC) are recorded, whereas large cavities with a total charge in excess of 10 pC are actually present in the gel. When PDs are repeated permanent degradations of the gel rapidly occur, showing the limited self-healing capabilities of silicone gels.     

On the Electric Breakdown Behavior of Silicone Gel at Interfaces

Electrically stressed interfaces between solids are considered as weak points in the electrical insulation technology. This matter of fact is founded in the presence of microscopic cavities or areas with a low material density in the interface layer. Silicone gel, which is a soft and conformable solid with certain tackiness, offers a good adaptation to any surface and the ability to fill in voids completely. Due to these properties the silicone gel is predestinated for the use at electrically stressed interfaces. The work presented, describes the electric breakdown behavior of the material used at interfaces. The results provide practical information for the design of electrical insulation using silicone gel.     

油纸绝缘气隙模型局部放电特性试验研究

为了研究直流输电系统中换流变压器油纸绝缘的局部放电特性,设计构造了典型的油纸局部放电模型———气隙放电模型。针对同一模型分别施以交流电压、直流电压以及冲击衰减振荡电压,采用IEC 60270-2000推荐的脉冲电流法分别检测与分析该模型局部放电的不同特征参数。对比研究了在交流、直流及振荡冲击电压下油纸绝缘气隙放电模型的局部放电脉冲特征参量包括局部放电起始电压、熄灭电压、放电波形、放电水平、放电重复率等,对实现换流变压器的局部放电在线监测与绝缘状态综合评估有一定的指导意义。     

振荡冲击及交流电压下绝缘子表面金属微粒放电特性研究

近年来由于绝缘子沿面放电引起的绝缘故障较为多见,冲击耐压及冲击下局部放电检测是绝缘考核和诊断的有效手段。文中采用IEC 60060-3推荐的振荡型雷电及操作冲击和工频交流电压,针对110 k V气体绝缘组合开关设备(GIS)真型绝缘子金属微粒缺陷模型进行了局部放电特性研究。在工频交流(AC)电压下,局部放电起始电压和闪络电压的差值小于2种振荡型冲击电压,其随气压增大而增加;在冲击电压下,局部放电大多发生在振荡周期的上升沿处,在电压波谷处会出现相反极性的局部放电脉冲;金属颗粒位置对放电量、放电重复率等影响较大。结论表明,相比于工频交流电压,GIS绝缘子表面金属颗粒缺陷在外施电压为振荡型冲击电压时易产生局部放电,说明了振荡型冲击电压局部放电检测具有较高缺陷检出能力。     

Partial discharges in a cavity at variable applied frequency part 2: measurements and modeling

In this paper partial discharges (PD) in a disc-shaped cavity are measured at variable frequency (0.01 ? 100 Hz) of the applied voltage. The measured PD phase and magnitude distributions, as well as the number of PDs per voltage cycle, changed with the varying frequency. A charge consistent model is presented and used to dynamically simulate the sequence of PDs in the cavity. The simulation results show that the properties of the cavity surface, mainly the surface conductivity and the surface emission of electrons, change with the varying applied frequency. This is interpreted as an effect of the difference in time between consecutive PDs at different applied frequencies. This is the second of two papers addressing the frequency dependence of PD in a cavity. The first paper described how the PD frequency dependence changes with the applied voltage amplitude, the cavity size and the cavity location.     

Comparison of Partial Discharge Resistance among Several Biodegradable Polymers

The partial discharge (PD) resistance of three kinds of biodegradable polymers, namely poly-L-lactic acid (PLLA), polybutylene succinate (PBS), and poly f-caprolactone butylene succinate (PCL-BS), was studied in comparison to that of low-density polyethylene (LDPE). The polymers were exposed to PDs under the IEC (b) electrode system, and the PD resistance was judged by the surface erosion depth or the time to breakdown induced by PDs. As a result, the 'practical' PD resistance, which is the resistance to PDs under a constant voltage application, is ranked as LDPE > PLLA PBS > PCL-BS, while the 'true' PD resistance, which is the resistance to PDs with a constant charge quantity, is ranked as PLLA = LDPE > PBS PCL-BS.     

Electrical treeing phenomena in two-layer silicone gel with different crosslinking degrees and its dielectric strength

Silicone gel is widely used to encapsulate power modules, and improvement of its dielectric strength has been required. So, the purpose of our research is to improve dielectric strength of silicone gel encapsulant, and we focus on crosslinking degree of silicone gel. Previous studies have shown that growth mechanism of electrical tree changes with crosslinking degree of silicone gel. This suggests the possibility that the presence of the interface by different crosslinking degrees inhibits the tree growth. In this paper, we have investigated the tree growth and breakdown characteristics in silicone gel—crosslinking degrees graded layer materials. The interfaces in our study are arrange as being vertical to the line of electric force. Consequently, it was clarified that barrier effect of interface by different crosslinking degrees and the relaxation of electric field in low crosslinking degree region retards on tree growth, which improves the dielectric strength.     

Classification of multiple partial discharge sources in dielectric insulation material using Cepstrum analysis–artificial neural network

In high‐voltage equipment insulation, multiple partial discharge (PD) sources may exist at the same time. Therefore, it is important to identify PDs from different PD sources under noisy condition in insulations, with the highest accuracy. Although many studies on classifying different PD types in insulation have been performed, some signal processing methods have not been used in the past for this application. Thus, in this work, Cepstrum analysis on PD signals combined with artificial neural network (ANN) is proposed to classify the PD types from different PD sources simultaneously under noisy condition. Measurement data from different sources of artificial PD signals were recorded from insulation materials. Feature extractions were performed on the recorded signals, including Cepstrum analysis, discrete wavelet transform, discrete Fourier transform, and wavelet packet transform for comparison between the different methods. The features extracted were used to train the ANN. To investigate the classification accuracy under noisy signals, the remaining data were corrupted with artificial noise. The noisy data were classified using the ANN, which had been trained by noise‐free PD signals. It is found that Cepstrum–ANN yields the highest classification accuracy for noisy PD signals than the other methods tested. © 2016 Institute of Electrical Engineers of Japan. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

振荡冲击电压下典型绝缘模型局部放电解析(英文)

The aim of this paper was to give an overview on partial discharges under oscillating impulse voltage.Three models(void in solid,needle-plate in air and oil) were presented,which describe the stochastic discharge process and represent internal discharges in solids and corona in air or silicon oil.Moreover,an air cored Rogowski coil and a sampling resistor for partial discharge(PD) measurement were developed and introduced in this paper.PD inception and extinction voltages(PDIV,PDEV) under single oscillating impulse voltage and AC voltage were investigated with different test samples.Experimental results firstly revealed that the PD inception voltage(PDIV) decreased with increasing applied voltage;secondly the PD inception voltage for three different insulating materials,showed an escalating trend with increasing frequency of the applied voltage.It was proven that the characteristics of PD under oscillating impulse voltage were identical to the features under AC voltage,which could be measured with the phase resolved partial discharge analysis(PRPDA) technique.Based on the reorganization and analysis of PDs under oscillating impulse voltage,the information about insulation defects was extracted from the measured data and used for estimating the risk of insulation failure of the equipment.     

Measuring partial discharges under pulsed voltage conditions

Partial Discharges (PDs) measurement deserves a specific study when in the presence of fast rising/falling voltages, as the output of IGBT switching devices. In such operating conditions, the choice of a proper detection system is crucial in order to have the best signal to noise ratio and to solve some problems linked to the specific characteristics of the voltage waveform. This work proposes a comparison between a high frequency ultra wide band (HF UWB), and two different low frequency selective wide band (LF SWB) PD detection systems. The performance of such systems have been assessed during tests performed on twisted pair enameled wire specimens. These tests have been carried out applying pulsed voltage waveforms, while having different amplitudes and rise times, reproducing the output of a switching device. The outcome evidence is that, in the considered conditions, the HF UWB systems cannot provide correct information about the intensity of PD stress and the severity of the relevant degradation. It is also demonstrated that with proper optimizing of the output signal of the LF SWB system, it is possible to obtain reliable quantities that can be used to implement empirical models. Such models can be useful to predict the residual duration of twisted pair specimens, after a short monitoring of PD activity during aging tests.     

空气中电晕放电与绝缘液体中流注放电的测量和分析(英文)

Insulation is one of the most important parts in a high voltage equipment.There are gaseous,liquid and solid insulations which are commonly used.In a high voltage transformer for example the insulating materials are all used.During operation of a high voltage equipment high electric stress may occur.Under extreme condition failure of the insulation may take place.Excessive electric field in air may cause corona discharges while in liquid insulation discharges may take place in the form of streamer.This paper reports experimental results on the corona and streamer discharges in air and silicone oil.The discharges were artificially generated around a needle tip in a needle-plane electrode system with gap length of 4 mm under sinusoidal and triangular voltages.The needle was made of steel with tip radius of 3 μm and curvature angle of 30°.The needle was made by Ogura Jewelry.The discharge pulses were measured using personal-computer based partial discharge(PD)measurement system with sensitivity of better than 0.5 pC.The system is able to measure discharge in time sequential.Phase-resolved analysis of the discharges was done to interpret the physical processes behind the discharges.The experimental results showed that corona discharges took place at negative half cycles.The discharges were concentrated around 270° of phase angle of applied voltage.The discharge magnitude and discharge number of corona clearly dependent on the instantaneous of applied voltage.These were strongly supported by the application of triangular voltage.Streamer discharges occurred at both positive and negative half cycles.The discharges pulses concentrated around the peak of applied voltage at phase angle of 90° and 270°.Experimental results under sinusoidal and triangular voltages revealed that streamer discharge magnitude as well as probability of occurrence was strongly dependent on the instantaneous applied voltage.     

Development of a new detection method of partial discharge for EHV long-distance active cable line

A new method was used to measure the characteristics of partial discharge (PD) for an active 9.5-km long-distance 275-kV XLPE cable line with insulating joints. It was found that the detection of PD and the calibration of detection sensitivity were carried out safely and easily. The proposed method includes:

• 1 detection of PDs and injection of calibration pulses using two pairs of metal electrodes placed on PVC jackets with anti-corrosion layers separated by a joint sleeve sectionalizing insulator;
• 2 measurement of detection sensitivity with distance using calibration pulses injected from an adjacent insulating joint;
• 3 detection of PDs with a high S/N ratio measured at a frequency corresponding to the lowest noise level; and
• 4 usage of rf cores attached at cross-bonding leads and wires for sheath current limiters to reduce the crosstalk of signal and noise through these lines at insulating joints.

Using a combination of these techniques, the highest detection sensitivity was 1 pC in the vicinity of an insulating joint, and 15 pC at 617 m from the adjacent joint. The sensitivity obtained by the conventional PD measurement using a low-frequency method was at most 1000 pC.     

高温下110kV交联聚乙烯电缆电树枝生长及局部放电特性

利用实时显微数字摄像与局部放电连续测量系统,采用典型针-板电极结构,研究了高温下不同外施工频电压作用时110kV级交联聚乙烯(XLPE)电缆绝缘中典型电树枝的形态特征、引发、生长规律及其局部放电特性。实验结果表明,温度对XLPE电缆绝缘中典型电树枝的形态、引发与生长时间具有非常重要的影响。在高温下,不同外施工频电压作用时电树枝的形态呈现出多样性的特点,50°C下典型电树枝形态为枝状、枝-松枝状和丛状,70°C下为枝状,90°C下为滞长型和枝状。高温下电树枝引发时间随外施电压升高而减小,而且在同一外施电压下,电树枝引发时间随温度升高而减小,这是由于在高温下XLPE电缆绝缘中片晶熔化,无定形相增加,介质中自由体积扩大,从而更有利于电树枝引发。研究发现在低电压(9kV)下,电树枝生长过程中由于通道电导率增加而抑制了通道内局部放电的发展,局部放电作用减小,电树枝生长速度减慢,分形维数较高;而11kV以上电压作用时,电树枝在局部放电的连续作用下呈枝状向对面电极快速生长,同时高温下XLPE弹性模量下降,击穿场强降低,局部放电作用加剧,电树枝生长明显加速,电树枝分形维数较低。     

临近高压电气设备电缆局部放电脉冲的鉴别方法（英文）

On-line partial discharge(PD)diagnostics data are corrupted by various noise sources and this makes it more challenging to extract the PD signal contained in the raw data.Though the noise sources can be filtered out using signal processing techniques,PDs from neighboring cables and other high voltage equipment make the de-noising process more difficult due to the similar features of these signals with the PD signal of interest.Proposed in this paper is a double-ended partial discharge diagnostic system with dual sensors at each end which uses wireless time triggering using global time reference with the aid of global positioning system(GPS).Using the time of arrival method based on the velocity of propagation on the data,PD pulses originating from other sources can be discarded which reduces the volume of data to be stored and would eventually also reduce the hardware and software requirements of the denoising process thereby improving de-noising efficiency.System design,laboratory tests and on-site measurements are discussed.     

Properties of interfaces in silicone rubber

A salt fog test and an inclined plane test have been combined in order to trace changes in electrical and mechanical properties as well as in chemical stability of high temperature cured silicone rubber (HTV) samples containing interfaces. The interfaces were created in two different ways. The first technique, named adding/curing, was based on pressing together an uncured HTV silicone plate towards a piece of already cured one, followed by curing at atmospheric pressure and high temperature. The second type of interface was made by joining two pieces of cured HTV rubber by silicone glue (RTV-1). Thereafter both types of samples were divided in two parts, one of which was additionally exposed to UV-radiation before testing. The combined salt fog inclined plane test did not reveal significant differences in the development of leakage currents, in the change of surface roughness, or in the degree of surface oxidation in comparison to reference samples of cured HTV rubber without interfaces. At the same time the leakage currents became lower on the UV-exposed samples. It is suggested that the reduction in leakage currents resulted from a combination of increased surface roughness and increased hydrophobicity. Reduction of mechanical properties of UV-exposed samples was also observed. The tensile testing showed that samples containing the adding/curing interfaces maintained their mechanical strength after ageing while the strength of the glued samples was significantly reduced, indicating that the adding/curing system has better long-term mechanical stability compared to the glued system     

Dielectric breakdown of low-density polyethylene under simulatedinverter voltages

Breakdown characteristics have been investigated for low-density polyethylene immersed in silicone oil by applying power-frequency ac voltages with high-frequency components, which are simulated output voltages of a pulse-width-modulation inverter. It was found that the breakdown voltage decreases as the high-frequency component increases. However, the number of zero-crossings of the applied voltage, which is very influential in water-tree growth, does not seem to play an important role in the dielectric breakdown process     

Surface degradation of polyamide nanocomposites caused by partial discharges using IEC (b) electrodes

Partial discharge (PD) degradation of polyamide both without nanoscale fillers (nanofillers) and with 2,4 and 5 wt% additions of nanofillers was investigated. Such materials were subjected to PDs using the IEC (b) electrodes for evaluation. Comparisons were made as to the surface roughness observed by scanning electron microscopy and atomic force microscopy. It was found that the change in the surface roughness is far smaller in specimens with nanofillers than those without nanofillers, and that the 2 wt% addition is sufficient for improvement of the surface roughness. Furthermore, it was elucidated that the difference of surface roughness of the degraded area due to PDs among the specimens originates from the difference in their crystalline structures. These results indicate that polyamide nanocomposite is more resistance to PDs than polyamide without nanofillers.     

场强的提高对局部放电测试的影响

局部放电 (PD)是检测 XL PE电缆缺陷的一种重要手段 ,缺陷会造成电缆的局部场强的不均匀 ,在施加外部电压后引起局部放电的现象。本文提出 :在 XL PE电缆承受耐压的过程中 ,采用提高场强的方法 ,能更有效地发现 PD缺陷 ,从而降低 XL PE电缆在运行中的击穿事故。     

PD characteristics in an air-filled void at room temperature undersuperimposed sinusoidal voltages

Partial discharge in an artificial air-filled void under superimposed sinusoidal voltages is investigated at room temperature in order to clarify the effect of voltage superposition. The applied voltage waveform is composed of a 60 Hz fundamental sinusoidal wave and a high frequency sinusoidal wave of 300 Hz to 1.2 kHz. It was found that PD started when the peak value of the superimposed voltage reached the PD inception voltage under 60 Hz sinusoidal voltage. Also, PD occurrence frequency increased remarkably when the peak value of the high frequency component exceeded a critical value, which is smaller than the PD inception voltage under 60 Hz sinusoidal voltage. PD characteristics under such conditions were discussed as the effect of the residual voltage, caused by the surface charge deposited in the void by the preceding PD. The obtained experimental results suggest that the superposition of high frequency component accelerates the degradation of the solid insulator containing void defects     

采用小波分析与神经网络技术的局部放电统计识别方法

小波变换技术适合于局部放电（PD）的检测与识别，但所用小波或提取的特取的特征量不合适时，识别效果不理想。因此，测量了6种典型绝缘缺陷模型产生的144组PD脉冲数据，用基数B样条导数小波成功地从这些实测数据的极强电磁干扰中检测出了PDs，得到了相应的三维统计分布图与各种二维统计分布图，提出了一种新的小波分解方法处理这些PDs对应的统计分布图，并在小波变换域定义了一组与传统方法完全不同的新特征量来识别这些PDs。以新定义的特征量组成输入矢量，用基于BP算法的前馈型神经网络，对6种典型PDs及加上4种混合PDs组成的共10种PDs进行了识别测试，识别效果远远优于现有方法水平。