On-line Detection of Low-level Arcing Faults in Metal-clad Electrical Apparatus

T. S . Sidhu G. S . Sagoo M. S . Sachdev

Power Systems Research Group

University of Saskatchewan
Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
CANADA S 7 N 5A9

Abstract: In history of metal-clad electrical apparatus, This paper presents a technique for fast and accurate
many equipment damages and burndown cases have detection of arcing faults in metal-clad electrical
been reported. The low-level electric arcing faults, equipment. The technique uses the “arcing fault
ultimately causing high level arcs, lead to extreme decision” based on analysis of the information from four
pressure development in switchgear rooms causing different sensors accounting for different physical
severe explosions and burndowns. This paper discusses phernomenon. Since, the technique relies on four different
the development of a microprocessor based detection physical phenomena, it is not affected by erroneous
system, based on four different physical phenomena,for signals. The technique is described with the hardware
reliable and accurate detection of arcingfaults in metal- and software used for its implementation. The proposed
clad electrical apparatus. Actual real-time arcing was technique was tested to detect arcing fault in a dry type
generated on a dry type ISkVA, 230/115V Y/A 15kVA, 2301115V Y I A transformer enclosed in a
transformer enclosed in a 30 ”x30”x21” metallic 30’’x30”x21” metallic enclosure. Results showing the
enclosure. Some results showing the performance of performance of proposed technique are included. The
detection system are presented in the paper. technique was also tested fix verifying its performance
during various types of outside disturbances.
Introduction
The Proposed Technique
Industrial growth over the last five to six decades has
resulted in a large increase in number of transmission I. Overview
and distribution substations. Due to shortage of free
space, it has always been endeavor of equipment This section presents the proposed technique, which
manufacturers to fit the apparatus in a space as small as detects the inception of low-level arcing faults in metal-
possible. The compressed version of electrical equipment clad electrical equipment. The technique makes use of
four different sensors vis-a-vis ultrasonic sensor, infrared
is prone to various types of faults, which can bring
senisor, radio-frequency sensor and acoustic sensor for
catastrophic damage to the whole system. Arcing fault is
one of those faults that can cause serious burndowns in accurate detection of arcing faults. This technique is
metal-clad apparatus. The underlying cause of reported based on the fact that occurrence of arcing fault is
damages in the past was found to be the arcing fault, that accompanied by generation of ultrasonic, infrared, radio
originated from very low level sparks but eventually lead and acoustic radiations. The presented technique
to uncontrollable fires and bumdowns [ 11. analyses the signals picked up by the sensors in response
to an arcing fault in the metal-clad equipment.
It has been found that low level arcing faults, which
ultimately give rise to severe fires and bumdowns, do not
cause significant change in system voltages and currents.
Therefore, the conventional protection techniques, based
on the system voltages and currents, are not sufficient to
combat these faults [2]. The ordinary protection systems
themselves become involved in the bumdown process
and let the fault propagate like a chain reaction. Other
methods proposed in the past used optical fiber and hall
generator sensors for detecting the inception of an arcing
fault [3]. These methods have their own limitations and
can not be used for reliable detection of low-level arcing
faults. Another detection technique based on three
different types of sensors was proposed and tested on
arcing generated by an arc generator [4]. This paper
discussed the possibility of application of that technique
in electrical equipment. Figure 1. Schematic diagram of the proposed technique.

02000 IEEE
0-7803-5957-7/00/$10.00
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Figure 1 shows the setup and various components of the
proposed technique. Two sets of sensors are located at
suitable locations in the metal enclosure. Appropriate
signal conditioning units are used to process the signals
received from sensors. These signals, being usually very
weak, are amplified and then applied to the measuring
device via isolation modules that provide the required
surge protection. The developed system quantifies the
signals using Data Acquisition System (DAS) card. A
Digital Signal Processing (DSP) card using an arc
detection algorithm processes the acquired data. A
communication card is provided for transferring. the
collected and processed information to remote locations.
All the cards are installed in the host PC.
2. Hardware
The hardware used in the proposed technique consists of
sensors, signal conditioning circuits, isolation modules
and a PC based microprocessor system. This section
provides a brief description of these components.
2.1. Sensors
Ultrasonic Sensor: It has been observed that inception of
arcing is always accompanied by the generation of
ultrasonic waves. The ultrasonic sensor with maximum
sensitivity of 4 7 d B at the center frequency of 40kI-Iz is
used to detect these waves. The ultrasonic sensor is
housed in a metallic case to ensure mechanical strength
and endurance. The sensor has the ability to operate in
hot and damp environment for long duration of time. To
provide insulation from the main power circuit, the
sensor was covered with rubber sheath.
Infrared Sensor: The heat produced during an arcing
fault gives rise to emission of infrared rays. A 2-pin NPN
silicon phototransistor molded in a black plastic package
and possessing stable characteristics and high
illumination sensitivity, is used to detect these rays. This
package is highly transmissive to the IR source energy
while it provides effective shielding against visible
ambient light. Spectral response characteristic of this
phototransistor is shown in Figure 2.
0.0
600 700
I
800 900 1000 1100
Wavelength (nm)
1200 ’ Infrared Simals: The signal obtained from infrared
Figure 2: Spectral characteristic of the phototransistor.
Radio-freauencv Sensor. A solenoid antenna of 5-cm
diameter is used to detect electromagnetic waves
generated by the arc. The antenna is made by 50 turns of
insulated copper wire on a cylinder made of cardboard.
Tests showed that this antenna can detect radio ’
frequency signals emitted by an arcing source located up
to 5 meters away.
Acoustic Sensor. Arcing always produces the audible
sound even if it is very weak and is not visible. It has
been found that conventional microphones cannot
distinguish between the sound coming directly from the
source and the sound coming from the source after the
reflections from the other objects. Some frequencies of
the audible sound get cancelled due to reflections on
other objects and articles.
Pressure Zone Microphones (PZMs) have been found
useful to eliminate the interference caused by the
reflected signals [5]. In PZM, an electret microphone
capsule is permanently mounted at a short distance from
its boundary plate. The electret microphone is connected
to an in-built amplifier. Output of the microphone is
taken through a twinax (2-wire shielded) cable and a !h”
phono plug. The microphone is mounted on a flat surface
near to the source. This prompts the direct and reflected
acoustic waves to arrive simultaneously at the sound
entry point and any phase cancellations are moved
outside the audible band of frequencies.
The PZM used in the proposed system has a sensitivity
of -74 dB and its frequency response is from 20 to
18,000 Hz.
2.2. Signal Conditioning Units
Signals generated by all four sensors during the
occurrence of arc are of very low magnitude. These are,
therefore, amplified and processed to extract the required
information. Signal conditioning circuits serve this
purpose and are described in the following paragraphs.
Ultrasonic Signals: Low level arcing generates very
feeble ultrasonic radiations that need to be amplified to
convey any picked up information. An amplifier stage
followed by a comparator circuit is used to extract useful
information from the output of an ultrasonic sensor. The
ultrasonic signal, after being amplified by the factor of
100, is compared with a reference signal. If the
amplitude of input signal is higher than the reference
signal, the circuit gives the output as ‘high’.
sensor, on occurrence of arcing, is fed to an amplifier
circuit that increases its level by a factor of 50.
73 1
Radio-fiemencv Simals: Electromagnetic radiation
generated during arcing fault is detected using a solenoid
antenna. This antenna receives wide spectrum of RF
waves when an arc is in the vicinity. The signals received
from antenna are passed through a detector circuit and
then amplified.
Acoustic Simals: The level of sound waves generated
can be very small for low-level arcing. These waves are
to be amplified suitably in order to extract useful
information from them. An amplifier stage with a gain
200 is, therefore, used to boost the level of sound waves
picked-up by PZM microphones.
2.3. PC Based Microprocessor System
A general purpose hardware [6], available in the Power
Systems Laboratory at the University of Saskatchewan is
used to acquire and process the amplified signals suitably
obtained from ultrasonic, infrared, radio-frequency and
acoustic sensors.
Figure 1 shows the block diagram of the system, which
includes a data acquisition system (DAS) card, digital
signal processing (DSP) card, a communication card and
an input-output port. Four isolation modules are
included, each containing two zener diodes. These diodes
protect the DAS card from high amplitude voltage
surges. The DAS card plugs into an expansion port of
the PC and is used for sampling and quantizing signals at
specified sampling rate. This card consists of 16 identical
channels. Each channel consists of a buffer and an
analog low pass filter. The DSP card, which also plugs in
an expansion port of the host PC, is based on Texas
Instruments TMS320C44 32-bit floating point digital
signal processor. It controls the data acquisition process
by exchanging signals over a parallel link. It also
implements the software and processes the acquired
signals. The host PC provides the user interface to the
DSP card and helps the user to perform all control
operations.
3. Sojiiare
3.1. Data Acquisition Module
The code for data acquisition module was written in
ANSI ‘C’ language and was compiled using the TMS320
floating point optimizing “GoDSP” compiler. The code
samples and quantifies the acquired signals by
controlling the DSP and DAS cards. The code for data
acquisition is executed using the Graphical User
Interface (GUI) for integrated detection system designed
in Visual Basic.
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The data acquisition code sets the value of sampling
rate and other data acquisition parameters such as
number of samples to be stored. Startlstop controls for
tht: data acquisition module are performed through the
GIJI. The code first calibrates and then samples the
inputs from all eight channels simultaneously. Channel 1
and 5 of the DAS card gets the input signals from the
ultrasonic sensors. Infrared signal inputs are given to
DAS card through Channels 2 and 6. Channels 3 and 7
are: used to get the input signals from the RF detectors.
The conditioned output from the acoustic sensors is
given to DAS card through channels 4 and 8. After the
samples are acquired and quantified, they are processed
by the DSP card to determine if an arc exists or not.
3.2. Arc Detection Module
Arc detection algorithm is run on the TMS320C44 DSP.
As discussed earlier, detection system decision is based
on the output of two sets of four different types of
sensors. For the electrical equipment larger in size,
number of sets of sensors can be increased depending
upon the coverage of each sensor for arcing faults, in
thxe-dimensional coordinate system. It has been found
that in a particular compartment of any metal-clad
eleotrical equipment, at least one sensor of each type is
activated due to arcing.
After acquiring the signals from all eight channels
synchronously, they are properly analyzed to make sure
that signal is due to the arcing only. Incoming signal
samples from each of the eight channels are compared
with the pre-set threshold values defined in the C-
language code for the detection system module. If the
incoming sample value for each channel is higher in
magnitude than the pre-set threshold value, a decision
signal of “1” is generated and this decision signal is
ORed with a similar decision generated for second
sensor of the same type. Finally, all four ORed outputs
are passed through an AND gate to get the final trip
signal. Figure 7 describes the trip logic for the detection
sysl.em.
At any given time, a buffer of size 200 maintains the
refreshed real-time data samples for all the eight
channels. After the arc inception is established, 100 each
of pre-fault and post-fault data samples are saved in the
DPIRAM of the DSP for further study and analysis.
The se pre-fault and post-fault data samples are extracted
from the buffer of 200 samples. This data is then
recovered back from the DPKAM using the code running
on the DSP and is stored in the host computer memory in
different data files. All these functions of the detection
module are implemented through the user friendly GUI.
 2. Test Results
A large number of tests were conducted to evaluate the
performance of the developed system. Various types of
disturbances were created to test their affect on the
Ch.2 performance of the proposed technique. Two typical test
Ch. 6 results are discussed in this section.
TRIP
Figure 9 shows the output of two sets of the four
ch.3 sensors on the occurrence of an arcing fault in the
Ch.7 transformer. The figures show that waves for all four
sensors start almost at the same time, which indicate that
all the sensors picked up the radiations generated due to
the arcing fault.
ch.8 I--= Ultrasonic Sensors

Figure 7: Trip logic

........... Sensor2

PERFORMANCE EVALUATION

The arc detection module was implemented and tested on

a dry type 15kVA, 23011 15V Y I A transformer enclosed
in a 3o”x3o”x21” metallic enclosure in the Power InfraredsenSoR
Systems Laboratory at the University of Saskatchewan.
em
- Sensorl
The following section describes the experimental setup sensor2
1!
and results obtained from various tests. P 2M
OW
0 I (I W M l W W U I r B O 1 8 0
1. Experimental Setup
Two sets of four sensors were placed at appropriate
places in metallic enclosure containing transformer. RF Sensors
These sensors were connected to the data acquisition
system through isolating and signal conditioning circuits 0-15
-
...........
Sensorl
Sensor2

as indicated in Figure 1.

Graphical User Interface written in Visual Basic was

used to load and run the data acquisition and arc
detection software on the DSP processor. A sampling
frequency of 1200 Hz was used to acquire the real time Acoustic Sensors

signals. Figure 8 shows the experimental setup used to 0.15 - Sensorl

carry out the tests to evaluate the performance of 0.10 1 I
........... Sensor2
detection system for arcing faults.

Figure 9: Response of the detection system for an arcing

fault when the enclosure is placed in normal ambient
conditions.

Figure 10 shows another set of signals for an arcing

fault outside the metallic enclosure. It was found that
detection system sensors placed inside the enclosure, did
not respond to the arcing fault outside the enclosure.

Figure 8: Experimental setup.

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 Ultrasonic Sensors
‘The proposed technique detects the occurrence of an
arcing fault as soon as it takes place. Hence, the
-
..........
Sensorl
Sensor2
electrical equipment can be isolated well in time to
prevent the possible damages. It was found that various
types of disturbances taking place outside the enclosure
. . . . . . . . .
0 20 40 BO m 100 120 U) lm 180
have no impact on the performance of detection system.
Timymu)
The presented technique can be successfully used for
detection of arcing faults in metal-clad low/medium
voltage air insulated switchgear, high current generator
bus -ducts, gas insulated switchgear, power-electronic
afv. .......... sensor2 drives and other metal enclosed electrical equipment.
a om.
3 am.
om.
REFERENCES

.[1]. Shields, F. J., “The Problem of Arcing Faults in

Lowvoltage Power Distribution Systems”, IEEE
Rf Sensors Transactions on Industry and General Applications, Vol.
1.m
-
..........
Sensorl
Sensor2 IGA-3, No. 1, Jan./Feb. 1967, pp. - 15-25.
am I
[2]. Sachdev M.S. (coordinator), Advancements in
Microprocessor-Based Protection and Communication,
1EE.Etutorial course text, 97TP120-0, 1997.

[3]. Sidhu, T.S., Singh, Gurdeep and Sachdev, M.S.,

“Microprocessor Based Instrument For Detecting And
0.30
Locating Arcs”, IEEE Transactions on Power Delivery,
2 OlO Vol. 13, No. 4, October 1998, pp. 1079-85.
3 Q ~ O Q $ 0 o;i I;O rio &I
““1
4.50 [4]. Schau, H. and Stade, D., “Protection Against
Disturbing Arcs In Low Voltage Switchgear”, 2tfh
Universities Power Engineering Confemce, Stafford,
Figure 10: Response of the detection system for arcing at UK. 1993, Session 4, Proceedings No. 81.
an outside location at a distance of 25 cms from the
enclosure. [SI. Pressure Zone Microphone (PZM), PAT. No.
436 1736 Radio Shack Division, Tandy Electronics
CONCLUSIONS Limited, Barrie, Ontario, Canada L4M 4W5.

This paper has presented a reliable technique for the [6]. Sidhu, T.S., Sachdev, M.S. and Das R. “Modem
detection of arcing faults in metal-clad electrical Relays: Research and Teaching Using PCs” IEEE
equipment. Arcing fault generates ultrasonic, infrared, Computer Applications in Power, Vol. 10, No.2, April
radio frequency and acoustic radiations, which are 199’7, pp. 50-55.
detected using ultrasonic ceramic, phototransistor,
solenoid antenna and PZM sensors respectively.

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