Electrical Techniques:

Current, Flux and

Power
Monitoring
Introduction
 Within the machine the magnetic flux varies, circumferentially in the airgap,
periodically in space and, for an AC machine, periodically with time
 Under ideal conditions this magnetic flux waveform will be symmetrical but
electrical faults in the machine will distort it.
 Rotor faults could be detected by electrical sensors fixed to the rotor, and stator
faults could be detected by electrical sensors fixed to the stator.
 Faults on either rotor or stator disrupt the radial and circumferential patterns of
flux in the machine causing changes to the power being fed to the machine.
 which can be detected via its terminal quantities – voltage, current and power –
measured outside the machine to give an indication of its condition.
Generator and Motor Stator Faults
 Generator stator winding fault detection
 on-line discharge detection
 Stator current monitoring for stator faults
 mostly concerned with motors
 effect of faults on vibrations, which also considered rotor eccentricity but is
extended to consider stator winding faults.
 Brush gear fault detection
 Brush gear requires a steady maintenance if good performance with the minimum of
sparking is to be maintained.
 Poor performance can be detected by measuring brush or brush-holder temperature.
 Detect the radiofrequency (RF) energy generated by sparking using direct method.
Generator and Motor Stator Faults contd..

 Direct Method:
 They used a wide-bandwidth dipole antenna connected to an RF amplifier
with a bandwidth of 10–100 MHz, the output of which was rectified.
 The processing electronics measured the area under any pulses of RF power
that enter the monitor as a result of sparking activity at the brushes.
 The monitor thereby produces a chart record showing the average area of
sparking pulse and researchers relate this to a ‘spark number’ indicating an
intensity of sparking.
 Rotor-mounted search coils
 No techniques reported for detecting stator faults by search coils mounted
upon the rotor
 Problem of mounting expensive instrument slip rings on the rotor and its
effectiveness is limited by the reliability of the measurement brushgear.
Generator rotor faults
 Earth leakage faults on-line
 A single earth leakage fault on a generator rotor winding is not serious in itself,
 Because it cannot cause any damage as the earth leakage current is limited to
leakage resistance of the excitation supply
 If two well-separated earth faults occur then large currents can flow, leading to
significant damage to the winding, its insulation and the rotor forging.
 Detecting rotor earth faults:
(a) Use of an earth leakage relay.
(b) Monitoring of an existing earth fault using a potentiometer.
(c) Monitoring for a second earth fault by measuring resistance to earth from
each end of the winding.
Using Earth Leakage Relay
 The aim of a rotor earth fault detector
is to apply a DC bias voltage to the
rotor winding and monitor the current
flowing to the rotor body via an alarm
relay.
 If such an alarm occurs, many utilities
would consider that the machine
should be shut down so that the rotor
can be investigated.
 However, operational pressures are
such that this is often not possible,
and it is necessary to continue running
the unit.
 The next step then is to monitor the
earth leakage current and manually
trip the unit if there is any further
increase, indicative of a second earth
fault.
Existing Earth Fault Using Potentiometer
 An alternative method is to use a
potentiometer fed to earth via a
sensitive galvanometer making a
bridge circuit.
 As the earth fault location alters
or a second fault occurs the bridge
unbalances and an indication
occurs on the meter.
 The problem is that the second
earth fault may arise close to the
location of the first fault and the
resultant change in earth leakage
current may not be particularly
large.
Second Earth Fault By Measuring
Resistance
 A more sensitive indicator of the
onset of a second earth fault is the
resistance of the winding to earth,
measured from either terminal.
 Such a technique has been
described using two voltmeters, V1
and V2.
 When the switch is open the fault
position, K, defined as the
fractional position up the winding
from the negative slip ring, can be
calculated:
 When the switch is closed to A the voltages V1 and V2 will change by
an amount depending on the fault resistance, Rf , and the current
flowing through the fault, If , so that now the apparent position K is
given by:

 From the apparent change in fault position ΔK = K‫ ׳‬− K, the voltage

across the fault resistance can be calculated and finally the fault
resistance itself.
 This procedure can be repeated by connecting the voltmeters to the
other terminal of the winding, by closing the switch to B.
 The choice of terminal connection is governed by the initial fault
position, the object being to optimise the measurement of the fault
resistance Rf .
 The scheme can be implemented using a microprocessor-based unit,
which makes the measurement at each terminal of the winding at
intervals of approximately 1 s, processes the results and presents
information for operating staff as well as initiating relay indications if
necessary.
Turn-to-turn and earth leakage faults
off-line
 Surge techniques have been used for many years by transformer
manufacturers for locating faults in windings.
 More recently turbine generator manufacturers have used similar techniques
for pinpointing faults in their rotor windings, as a quality control check
immediately after a rotor has been assembled.
 such a technique can be used to detect both earth leakage and turn-to-turn
faults on generators during their service lives.
 Which used a mercury-wetted contact relay to develop recurrent, rapid rise
time surges that were injected into the winding between the slip-ring and the
earthed body of the rotor
 Figure (a) shows this
recurrent surge
generator, which is
switched on and off at a
frequency of 50 Hz,
 Figure (b) shows the
connection of the
generator to the rotor
winding.
 The winding
approximates to a simple
transmission line where
the propagation is
dominated by the
geometry and insulation
of the winding conductor
in the rotor slot.
 Mutual coupling
between turns of the
winding will cause
dispersion but this effect
has been found to be
small in solid-steel
rotors
 When the surge is injected at one end it has a magnitude determined by the
source impedance, R, of the recurrent surge generator and the surge
impedance of the winding, Z0.
 The surge propagates to the far end of the winding in a time, t, determined b
y the length and propagation velocity of the winding.
 The surge is reflected at the far end, its magnitude determined by the
reflection coefficient, kr .
 For a winding with the far end open-circuited, kr = 1 and with it short-
circuited kr = −1.
 The reflected surge returns to the source and if the source impedance equals
the surge impedance of the winding (kr = 0 at source), it is absorbed without
further reflection
 When an insulation fault to earth or a turn-to-turn fault is encountered, this
reflection pattern will be disrupted and may be observed on the oscilloscope.
 The pattern on the oscilloscope is known as a recurrent surge oscillograph
(RSO) and this has become the name of the technique.
 The rise time of the surge will affect the method’s sensitivity and must be
less than the propagation time of the surge-front through a single winding
turn for sharp reflection to occur.
 The source impedance R was adjusted to be equal to the winding surge
impedance and a surge of between 10 and 100 V was applied with a rise time
of 20 ns.
 The surge was injected into each end of the winding, with the far-end open
circuited, and two reflection traces were obtained as shown in parts (i) and
(ii) of Figure (b), either of which should be compared to the ideal response of
part (i) of Figure(a).
 The results show the distortion of the trace as a result of dispersion and the
lack of surge sharpness.
 Faults are indicated by superimposing the two traces and observing any
deviations between them, as shown in parts (ii) and (iii) of Figure (b).
 Earth faults may be approximately located by taking the ratio of the times for
reflections from the fault and from the end of the winding.
 Similarly the electrical length of the winding can be estimated by measuring
the time for the surge to make a single pass through the winding.
 This can be done by short-circuiting the far end of the winding to obtain a
trace like that in part (ii) of Figure(a).
 Any shortening of the length indicates that shorted turns are present in the
winding.
Salient Points About The Technique
 The surge impedance of a rotor winding lies between 20 and 30 .
 A deviation becomes observable on the RSO trace when the impedance to
earth of the fault is a significantly small multiple of the surge impedance.
 In general, the technique can detect faults with impedances to earth of less
than 500–600Ω.
 Similarly the technique can detect a turn-to-turn fault that has a resistance
significantly less than the surge impedance, say of the order of 10Ω down to
zero.
 To carry out RSO measurements the generator must be isolated, the field de-
energised and the exciter connection disconnected.
 rotor faults are affected by both gravitational and centrifugal forces upon the
conductors during rotation, so it is common to carry out the tests stationary,
at barring and at speed for comparison purposes.
 it cannot be used for brushless machines without the rotor being stationary
Advantage and Disadvantage:
 The advantages of the technique are that with the oscillographs it provides a
permanent record of the state of a rotor throughout its service life and it can
detect both earth and inter-turn faults before their resistance falls to a value
where large fault currents flow.
 the deterioration of a winding can be assessed by a comparison between
oscillographs obtained from the same rotor.

 The disadvantages are that it detects faults of high resistance and is unable
todifferentiate between faults that are operationally significant and those
that are not.
 Also, it cannot be used on-line, testing the winding under truly operational
mechanical and thermal conditions.
Motor Rotor Faults : Airgap search coils
 Turn-to-turn faults in a rotor winding may lead to local overheating and
eventually to rotor earth faults.
 In addition, the shorting of turns causes unequal heating of the rotor leading
to bending and an unbalanced pull, which together cause increased vibration.
 Such faults can be detected on-line by using a stationary search coil fitted in
the airgap of the machine.
 The search coil, of diameter less than the tooth-width of the rotor, is fixed to
the stator usually in the airgap, and detects either the radial or
circumferential component of magnetic flux.
 The method is used experimentally on small induction motors but for
measuring torque rather than machine faults.
 A search coil monitors the rate of change of leakage flux in the air gap as the
rotor rotates.
 The signal from one pole is subtracted from the signal from the other;
significant differences are indicative of one or more turns in a coil becoming
short-circuited.
Stator Current Monitoring For Rotor Faults

 Any rotor fault in an induction motor will cause a characteristic swing in the
supply ammeter reading, which maintenance staff have come to recognize as
indicating that trouble is on its way.
 Careful measurement of the stator current will therefore enable such a fault
to be monitored.
 Although the technique of using a stator search coil has not been widely used,
it is possible to use the stator winding itself as a search coil.
 The current drawn by an ideal motor should have a single component of
supply frequency.
 Changes in load will modulate the amplitude of the current to produce side
bands.
 Faults in the rotor circuit will generate a side band below the supply
frequency and displaced from it by twice the slip frequency.
 A motor winding with p pole pairs and supply frequency ωse produces a
fundamental stator radial MMF wave, f1, at mechanical angle θ1 containing
odd harmonics only. Consider the fundamental MMF wave
f1(t) = N1I1 sin(ωset − pθ1)
 where N1 is the number of stator turns and I1 is the stator current. The angle,
θ2, on the rotor is given by
θ2 = θ1 − ωrmt
 where ωrm is the angular speed of the rotor and the rotational speed N =
60ωrm/2π,
 so that for a p pole pair rotor the rotor sees the MMF:
f1(t) = N1I1 sin[(ωse − pωrm)t − pθ2]
 This MMF rotates forward with respect to the rotor at the slip speed; however,
under normal circumstances the rotor carries induced currents, which establish
a fundamental rotor MMF wave, f2, to counter the stator MMF and move at the
same speed:
f2(t) = N2I2 sin[(ωse − pωrm)t − pθ2]
 If the rotor has a fault, such as a broken bar, the MMF due to the rotor current is
modulated by sin2pθ2 so that:
f2(t) = N2I2 sin[(ωse − pωrm)t − pθ2] sin 2pθ2
= N2I2/2 {cos[(ωse − pωrm)t − 3pθ2] − cos[(ωse − pωrm)t + pθ2]}
= N2I2/2{cos[(ωse + 2pωrm)t − 3pθ1] − cos[(ωse − 2pωrm)t + pθ1]}
Observations

 The first component of MMF in above equation induces zero-sequence EMFs in

the three phase stator winding, because it contains 3ωset and 3θ1, and gives
rise to no current contribution from the supply.
 The second component of MMF, however, induces a proper three-phase set of
currents at the normal supply frequency but contains a component, or side
band, 2sωse below that frequency.
 This is twice the slip frequency modulation of the supply current that is seen
as the swing on the ammeter reading.
Rotor Current Monitoring
 The rotor circuits of wound rotor motors are usually poorly protected
in most installations.
 Faults in brazed joints and slip-ring connections have sometimes
caused severe damage because they have not been detected
promptly.
 Overheating of rotors can also be caused by current imbalance in the
external resistors or circuits connected to the slip rings.
 The low frequency of these currents makes measurements with
conventional current transformers inaccurate.
 Faults of these types were some of the reasons that encouraged the
development of proprietary leakage flux technique.
 However, low-frequency currents can be measured accurately by
Rogowski coils. These have been used to monitor the rotor resistance
currents in variable speed wound rotor motors
 The signals from the Rogowski coils
are integrated to give a voltage
proportional to rotor current.
 These signals are summed to give
the mean current in all three
phases of the rotor and are
compared to the individual phase
currents.
 Processing electronics then detects
whether severe unbalance is
present and provides amplitude
and alarm signals to the control
room.
 In practice the instrument has
been used to provide monitoring
indications that assist in
determining when motors should
be taken out of service for repair.