Application Note

Compensation of Aging Byproducts

Author
Martin Anglhuber | martin.anglhuber@omicron.at

Date
27.02.2015

Related OMICRON Product

DIRANA

Application Area
Transformer

Version
v1.1

Document ID
ANP_14005_ENU

Abstract
The background of aging byproducts in transformers, their effect on water determination and the
compensation of those byproducts within the DIRANA software are explained.

© OMICRON Page 1 of 8
Content

1 Aging byproducts in transformers ......................................................................................................3

2 Compensation of aging byproducts ....................................................................................................4
3 Case studies...........................................................................................................................................5
4 Other effects of aging byproducts .......................................................................................................6
4.1 Water in oil measurements .............................................................................................................6
4.2 Oil processing .................................................................................................................................7

Please use this note only in combination with the related product manual which contains several important
safety instructions. The user is responsible for every application that makes use of an OMICRON product.

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© OMICRON 2015. All rights reserved. This application note is a publication of OMICRON.
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The product information, specifications, and technical data embodied in this application note represent the technical status
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However, OMICRON does not assume responsibility for any inaccuracies which may be present.
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translation of this document is done for local requirements, and in the event of a dispute between the English and a non-
English version, the English version of this note shall govern.

© OMICRON 2015 Page 2 of 8

1 Aging byproducts in transformers
In mineral oil insulated transformers, not only the paper but also the oil is subject to aging. The main
aging process is oxidation which produces acids, ketones, alcohols and other substances. The aging
process is influenced by many factors such as temperature, oxygen content, the metals present (as
they are acting as catalysts) and the type and amount of inhibitors in the oil to name a few of the most
important ones.
The output of the numerous chemical reactions summarized as “oil aging” are commonly referred to
as “aging byproducts”.
As most of those byproducts are polar, they increase the oil conductivity and tend to bind to other
polar substances. This leads to increased dielectric losses, especially at low frequencies. The
problem is that water behaves in a similar way: It also increases the oil conductivity as well as the
dielectric losses at low frequencies (Figure 1).
Samples with a higher amount of aging byproducts will have higher losses than samples with a lower
amount of aging byproducts at the same water content and temperature. So those higher losses can
be either an effect of a higher content of water or a higher amount of aging byproducts or a combination
of both.

Figure 1: Increase of losses at low frequency in aged oil impregnated pressboard, compared to new oil impregnated pressboard

If a dielectric measurement system for water determination would not consider aging byproducts, an
increase of loss at low frequencies would always be identified as a higher water content. This would
lead to an overestimation of the water content when aging byproducts are present.

© OMICRON 2015 Page 3 of 8

2 Compensation of aging byproducts
As not considering aging byproducts will lead to an overestimation of the water content in case of
samples with aged oil, it is necessary to compensate this influence. OMICRON has developed an
algorithm which detects and compensates the influence of aging byproducts on the dielectric
response.
By default, this function is enabled in the DIRANA software. It may be disabled for special cases or to
visualize the influence of aging byproducts in a measurement. The function can be accessed via the
buttons “Assessment” → “Settings” and is called “Displayed Moisture Value” in the software versions
up to 1.6 (Figure 2). The setting “Corrected” means the compensation of aging byproducts is activated,
“Calculated” means it is deactivated.

Figure 2: Accessing the settings of the compensation of aging byproducts

After changing the setting to “Calculated”, an exclamation mark next to the moisture content indicates
the compensation is turned off which may lead to wrong moisture values if aging byproducts are
present (Figure 3). This indicator is only available in the advanced assessment, therefore it is
recommended to turn off the compensation of aging byproducts only if the advanced assessment is
used. The advanced assessment can be enabled as the default setting via the menu “Tools” →
“Options” → “Assessment”.

Figure 3: An exclamation mark next to the moisture value indicates the compensation of aging byproducts is turned off in the
assessment dialogue.

Please note the compensation of aging byproducts is only possible for mineral oil
impregnated cellulose, which is used by default. This means the insulation material
“default” has to stay selected and must not be changed (see “Assessment Settings” in
Figure 2).

© OMICRON 2015 Page 4 of 8

3 Case studies
The following case studies are intended as examples how large the influence of aging byproducts on
the water content might be.
The first graph (Figure 4) shows a measurement performed on an aged 30 MVA transformer at 25 °C.
The “hump” is at frequencies above 1 Hz which indicates either a very high oil conductivity or a high
water content. The assessment shows the water content is “only” about 2.9 wt.% with the
compensation of aging byproducts turned on. The reason for the hump at thigh frequencies is the very
high oil conductivity of about 1300 nS/m.
Without the compensation of aging byproducts, the assessed water content would be about 4.6 wt.%,
which would mean an overestimation of 1.7 wt.%.

Figure 4: Dielectric response of an aged 30 MVA transformer

The second example shows a test of a 10 MVA transformer at 17 °C. The hump is also at a quite high
frequency of 0.5 Hz (Figure 5). Using the compensation of aging byproducts, the assessed water
content is about 2.7 wt.% whereas without the compensation it would be 3.7 wt.%. Here, the
compensation for aging byproducts prevents a deviation of 1 wt.%.

Figure 5: Dielectric response of an aged 10 MVA transformer

© OMICRON 2015 Page 5 of 8

4 Other effects of aging byproducts

4.1 Water in oil measurements

Aging byproducts in the oil are also affecting other types of measurements. One example is the
measurement of the water content in oil.
In an oil-paper system, there will be an equilibrium between the moisture in the paper and the moisture
in the oil if the temperature is stable and the migration processes have enough time. Generally, paper
can absorb much more water than oil, the relation is in the order of 1000:1 so nearly all the water in
the system is in the paper. This can also be seen by the fact that the water content in paper is usually
in the range of some few percent by weight (i.e. parts per hundred) whereas the water in the oil is in
the range of parts per million (ppm).
Aged oil can absorb much more water than new oil at the same relative humidity (Figure 6). So if the
oil is aged, its absolute water content will be much higher than if the oil is new, even if the absolute
humidity in the system is the same.
This shows the absolute water content of the oil is not only dependent on the water content of the
paper but also highly dependent on the aging state (i.e. the amount of aging byproducts) of the oil
itself. For estimating the water content of an oil paper system, it is more accurate to analyze the water
content of the paper where the majority of the water is located.

Figure 6: Water content in paper and oil in equilibrium, dependent on the aging state of the oil

© OMICRON 2015 Page 6 of 8

4.2 Oil processing
The effect also works the other way round: If the oil of a transformer is processed and filtered, aging
byproducts will be removed. When this process is only applied for a short time, the water content of
the transformer is barely changed due to the long time it would take for a significant amount of water
to migrate from the paper into the oil.
Nonetheless, an oil analysis will show a significant decrease of the water content of the oil (in ppm).
This is due to the removal of aging byproducts of the oil. Without those byproducts, the oil can’t absorb
so much water anymore and its water content will decrease. But as only a very small friction (in the
order of 1/1000) of the water content of the transformer is located in the oil, the water content of the
transformer stays practically the same.
The effect of removing the aging byproducts is also visible in the dielectric response (Figure 7), but as
the assessment algorithm separates the effect of water content, oil conductivity and oil aging, the
assessed water content will be the same, even if the curves look different.

Figure 7: Dielectric response of a transformer before and after processing the oil

© OMICRON 2015 Page 7 of 8

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