Introduction:

The insulator for overhead lines provides insulation to the power

conductor from the ground. The insulators are connected to the cross arm of the
supporting structure and the power conductor passes through the clamp of the
insulator. These insulators are mainly made of either glazed porcelain or toughened
glass. The materials used for porcelain are silica 20%, feldspar 30%, and clay 50%. The
porcelain should be ivory white, sound and free from defects. It should be vitrified
because the presence of pores or air in the porcelain will lower down its dielectric
strength. Any sealed air impurity will also lower the dielectric strength of porcelain. It
is, therefore, desirable that porcelain to be used for insulator should be air free and
impervious to the entrance of liquid and gases. The dielectric strength of porcelain
should be 15kV to 17kV for every one tenth inch thickness. Normally it is difficult to
manufacture homogeneous porcelain and therefore for a particular operating voltage
two, three or more pieces construction is adopted in which each piece glazed
separately and then they are cemented together. Porcelain is mechanically strong and
less effected by temperature and has minimum leakage problem.

Toughened glass is also sometimes used for insulators because it has

higher dielectric strength ( 35kV for one-tenth inch thickness ) which makes it possible
to make use of single piece construction, whatever be the operating voltage. Glass
being transparent, it is very easy to detect any flaw like trapping of air etc. it has lower
co-efficient of thermal expansion and, as a result the strains due to temperature
changes are minimized. The major drawback of glass is that moisture condenses very
easily on its surface and hence its use is limited to about 33kV.

The design of the insulator is such that the stress due to contraction and
expansion in any part of the insulator does not lead to any defect. It is desirable not to
allow porcelain to come in direct contact with a hard metal screw thread. Normally
cement is used between metal and the porcelain. It is see that cement to use does not
cause fracture by expansion or contraction.

Types of insulators:

There are three types of insulators used for overhead lines

 Pin type

 Suspension type

 Strain type

Pin type insulator consist of a single or multiple shells ( petticoats or rain sheds )
adapted to be mounted on a spindle to be fixed to the cross arm of the supporting
structure. Multiples shells are provided in obtain sufficient length of leakage path so
that the flash over voltage between the power conductor and the pin of the insulator is
increased. The design of the shell is such that when the upper most shell is wet due to
the rain the lower shell are dry and provide sufficient leakage resistance. It is desirable
that the horizontal distance between the tip of the lowermost shell should be less as
compared with the vertical distance between the same tip and the cross arm,
otherwise in case of an arc-over, the discharge will take place between the power
conductor and the pin of the insulator, thereby, the cross arm will have to be replaced
rather than the insulator. It is to be noted that the power conductor passes through the
groove at the top of the insulator and is tied to the insulator by the annealed wire of
the same material as the conductor. The pin type insulator is normally used up to 33kV.
In any case it is not desirable to use them beyond 50kV as the cost of such insulators
then increase much faster than the voltage. The cost beyond 50kV is given by

Cos ∝ Vx ( x > 2)

The insulator and its pins should be sufficiently mechanically strong to withstand the
resultant force due to the combined effect of the weight of the conductor, wind
pressure and the ice loading if any per span length.

The pin type of insulators is uneconomical beyond 33kV operating voltage.

Also the replacement of these insulators is expensive. For these reasons for insulation
overhead lines against higher voltages, suspension insulators are used.

Theses insulators consists of one or more insulator units flexibly

connected together and adopted to be hung for the cross arm of the sporting structure
and to carry a power conductor at its lowest extremity. Such composite units are known
as string insulators. Each insulator is a large disc shape piece of porcelain grooved on
the undersurface to increase the surface leakage path between the metal cap at the
top and the metal pin at the bottom of the insulator. The cap at the top is increased so
that it can take the pin of another unit and in this way a string of any required number
of insulators can be built. The cap and the pin are squired by means of cement. The
standard unit is 10n X 5.75n in size. The diameter is taken as 10n as it gives optimum
spark over to puncture voltage ratio. Increasing the diameter further increases the
flash over or spark over voltage but it lower the above ratio which is undesirable.

Suspension insulators being free to swing, the clearances required

between the power conductor and the suspension structure are more as compared to
pin type insulators. This means the length of the cross arm for suspension insulators is
more as compared with the pin type.

The suspension insulators, in addition to being economical as compared to

pin type for voltage more than 33kV, have the following further advantages,

 Each insulator is designed for11kV and hence for any operating voltage a
string of insulators can be used

 In case of failure of one of the units in string, only that particular unit
needs replacement rather than the whole string.

 Since the power conductor and string swing together in case of wind
pressure, the mechanical stress at the point of attachment are reduced
as compared with the pin type of insulator where because of the rigid
nature of the attachment fatigue and ultimate brittleness of the wire
result.
  The operating of the existing transmission can be increased by adding
suitable number of discs in the string instead of replacing all the
insulators as is necessary in case of pin type insulators.

The strain insulators are exactly identical in shape with the suspension
insulators. Theses strings are placed in the horizontal plane rather than vertical. As is
done in case of suspension insulators. Theses are used to take the tension of the
conductors at line terminals, at angle towers, at road crossings and at junctions of
overhead lines with cables. These insulators are therefore known as tension or strain
insulators. For low voltage of the order of 11kV, shackle insulators are used. But for
higher voltages a string of insulator is used. Whenever the tension in the conductor is
very high as at long river crossing, some times two, even three, string of insulators in
parallel have been used.

Advantages and disadvantages of grading of units methods:

In string with graded unit method difference capacities are required. This
requires large stocks of difference size units, which is uneconomical and impractical.
Therefore this method is normally not used except for very high voltage lines. But it is
very economical, very easy and very simple method used in very high voltage
transmission systems.

String with identical unit and graded ring method is very simple method. It can
be easily taken the same voltage distribution throughout the string accurately than
string with graded units method. But it is difficult to find the capacitors which have
various values. Therefore little bit errors can be occurred. And also it should be used
another conductor, that is an uneconomical reason to remove this method in some
applications.

Reasons for difference between theoretical and practical values :

The capacitors which we used may not be worked correctly and sometimes they
may not be represented the actual values. The components which we used for this
practical can be worked with errors. Human errors also can be happen. In our model we
missed the lowermost capacitance which is in between the conductor and the ground.
So it can be made some errors.

References:

Electrical Power Systems ( Third Edition ) - by C. L. WADHWA

SUSPENSION INSULATOR STRING
NAME: SENEVIRATHNE M. R.
K. C.

INDEX NO: 050424X

DATE OF PERFOMANCE : 28 /
06 / 07

DATE OF SUBMISSION : 11 /
07 / 07