500
2, APRIL 2002
Modeling Transformers With Internal Incipient Faults
Hang Wang, Student Member, IEEE, and Karen L. Butler, Senior Member, IEEE
Abstract—Incipient fault detection in transformers can provide
early warning of electrical failure and could prevent catastrophic
losses. To develop transformer incipient fault detection technique,
a transformer model to simulate internal incipient faults is
required. This paper presents a methodology to model internal
incipient winding faults in distribution transformers. These
models were implemented by combining deteriorating insulation
models with an internal short circuit fault model. The internal
short circuit fault model was developed using finite element
analysis. The deteriorating insulation model, including an aging
model and an arcing model connected in parallel, was developed
based on the physical behavior of aging insulation and the arcing
phenomena occurring when the insulation was severely damaged.
The characteristics of the incipient faults from the simulation were
compared with those from some potential experimental incipient
fault cases. The comparison showed the experimentally obtained
characteristics of terminal behaviors of the faulted transformer
were similar to the simulation results from the incipient fault
models.
Index Terms—Aging, arcing, distribution transformer, finite-
element analysis, internal incipient winding fault, modeling.
I. INTRODUCTION
I NTERNAL winding faults resulting from the degradation
of transformer winding insulation can be catastrophic and
hence expensive. In the new environment of deregulation, utili-
ties therefore are needing inexpensive methods employed to de-
tect such faults in the incipient stage. However, the implemen-
tations of the existing monitoring methods [1]–[4] tend to cost
too much to be applied to distribution transformers. Therefore,
an ongoing project in the Power Systems Automation Labora-
tory (PSAL) of Texas A&M University is to develop an on-line
incipient fault detection method for single-phase distribution
transformers that utilizes the terminal parameters of voltages
and currents. The development of an accurate internal fault di-
agnostic technique for transformers must be based on the anal-
ysis of quantities from fault scenarios. Considering the safety
of personnel, the damage that will occur in the transformer, the
consumed time, and related cost, simulation involving the mod-
eling of transformers at various incipient fault stages is the best
way to generate these fault cases.
Several transformer models have been developed for the
study of transformers with internal short circuit winding faults
[5]–[9] and some research work on the representation of
insulation material was done in the past [10]–[12]. However,
none of them discussed how to simulate an internal incipient
Manuscript received May 7, 2001. This work was supported by the National
Science Foundation through Grant ECS-9522208.
The authors are with the Department of Electrical Engineering, Power
Systems Automation Laboratory,Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
77843-3128 USA.
Publisher Item Identifier S 0885-8977(02)02742-5.
0885-8977/02$17.00 © 2002 IEEE
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 17, NO.
fault in transformers. This paper presents a new methodology
developed to model internal incipient winding faults in distribu-
tion transformers based on the author’s earlier work involving
the development of a two-dimensional (2-D) nonlinear finite
element analysis internal short circuit fault model [9].
This method contains a degrading insulation model and a
transformer internal short circuit fault model. Since deteri-
orating insulation involves two stages aging and arcing, the
degrading insulation model is composed of an aging model and
an arcing model connected in parallel. The degrading insulation
model was combined with the internal short circuit model,
developed in our earlier work, to simulate internal winding
incipient faults. The transformer internal incipient fault model
was implemented using commercially available finite element
analysis software. Various incipient fault scenarios at different
degrading levels of the transformer winding insulation were
simulated. In these fault scenarios, the terminal voltages and
currents of the transformer were analyzed in both time domain
and frequency domain. The characteristics obtained from the
simulation were compared with the characteristics obtained
from some experimental fault cases that conveyed incipient-like
behavior.
In this paper, the transformer model to simulate internal short
circuit winding faults is briefly introduced in Section II. Then
the method to simulate an incipient internal winding fault is dis-
cussed in more detail in Section III. In Section IV, some simu-
lation results are discussed and compared with experimental re-
sults. The conclusions are given in Section V.
II. INTERNAL SHORT CIRCUIT FAULT MODEL
A method was developed to apply finite element analysis to
calculate the parameters for an equivalent circuit of the trans-
former with an internal short circuit fault using ANSOFT’s
Maxwell Software [9]. The 2-D Magnetostatic solver in the
package was used to compute the model of the transformer and
export an equivalent circuit in the format of SPICE subcircuits.
Using finite element analysis to solve problems involves three
stages. The first step consists of meshing the problem space
into contiguous elements of suitable geometry and assigning
appropriate values of the material parameters—conductivity,
permeability, and permittivity—to each element. Since an
object with permeability equal to 1 in a magnetic model does
not need to be modeled, the insulation between the turns and
layers were ignored completely. The core was represented by a
rectangle with two windows. The nonlinear characteristics of
the core were input manually into the solver and assigned to the
core. To model an internal fault on the primary or secondary
winding, the faulted winding is divided into two subcoils “a”
and “b” (turn-to-earth fault) or three subcoils “a,” “b,” and “c”
WANG AND BUTLER: MODELING TRANSFORMERS WITH INTERNAL INCIPIENT FAULTS
(a) (b)
Fig. 1. Transformer model to simulate an internal fault.
(turn-to-turn fault). The primary winding and the secondary
windings are represented by polygons of corresponding ma-
terials. For instance, to simulate a turn-to-earth fault on the
primary winding, the transformer is modeled as shown in the
Fig. 1(a). The primary winding is divided into two subcoils “a”
and “b.” The transformer model to simulate a turn-to-turn fault
between two turns on the primary winding is represented as
shown in Fig. 1(b). The primary winding is divided into three
coils, “a,” “b,” and “c.”
Second, the model has to be excited to set up the initial condi-
tions. Since the subcoil with the maximum number of turns con-
tributes more in the magnetic field, the current source is input
into that subcoil and all the other coils are open-circuit. In the
above example, since subcoil “b” in Fig. 1(a) and subcoil “c” in
Fig. 1(b) represent more turns, respectively, they are energized
by the current source.
Finally, the boundary conditions for the problem have to be
specified. Balloon boundary is adopted in the simulation. Bal-
loon boundaries model the region outside the drawing space as
being nearly “infinitely” large; thus, it can effectively isolate the
model from other voltage sources.
In post-processing, the calculated parameters can be exported
into a SPICE subcircuit based on field solutions created in the
Maxwell 2-D field solver. The equivalent circuit derived from
the finite element analysis is displayed as a black box with a
set of interface terminals. The internal faults are simulated by
shorting the two terminals or connecting one terminal to the
ground.
To simulate an incipient internal winding fault, a model of
degraded insulation before breakdown replaced the switch be-
tween two turns to model an incipient internal winding fault.
III. DETERIORATING INSULATION MODEL
The deteriorating insulation between the turns is a major
cause of incipient internal winding faults in transformers.
During the operation of the transformer, a strong electric
field is applied to the dielectric material. It can result in the
aging and deterioration of the insulation. The relevant factors
generally recognized as causing the aging and deterioration
of an insulation include thermal stresses, electrical stresses,
mechanical stresses, moisture, and so on [13]. Thermal stresses
are caused by the internal heating due to current overloads
plus ambient temperatures. Electrical stresses are caused by
the voltage gradient in the insulation. Under normal operating
conditions, high voltage gradients below the breakdown voltage
do not cause detectable aging. However at elevated tempera-
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501
tures, electrical stresses may act to further accelerate material
degradation. Mechanical stresses are caused by assembly con-
figurations, manufacturing techniques, centrifugal forces and
vibration. Moisture is another major cause of lowered dielectric
properties. It can form a conductive path on the surfaces of
material or react with the material to cause chemical reversion.
The structure of a dielectric may be altered significantly
during the aging process, and these changes will affect the
electrical properties of the dielectric even before insulation
failure occurs [13], [14]. The relaxation processes a dielectric
undergoes, and hence the characteristics of dielectric loss,
depend on the structure. As the structure of the dielectric
molecules alter during aging, the dielectric characteristics and
electrical properties change. Normal aging of the insulation
may be manifested by the gradual reduction in its withstand
capability over a long period of time. In addtion, discharges
would like to take place on the surface of the solid insulation or
within enclosed voids. The gas ions driven by the electric field
would hit on the wall of the insulation and react chemically
with some of its surface layer molecules. Thus chemical and
thermal degradation of the insulating material occurs at these
microscopic sites. When a persistent discharge continues, it
is called an arc discharge. This can result in the failure of the
dielectric and a sudden breakdown under operating voltage.
To simulate the incipient internal winding faults completely,
both the aging phase and the arcing phase have to be taken into
account. Therefore, a combination of an insulation aging model
and an arcing model was developed to model an incipient in-
ternal winding fault.
A. Aging Model
In considering the electrical behavior of dielectric material,
it has been traditional to approach the subject in terms of an
equivalent parallel circuit as shown in Fig. 2 [14]. is the ap-
plied voltage and is the current through the insulation. is the
capacitive component of current and the resistive component of
the current is . The resistance represents the lossy part
of the dielectric, taking account of the losses that may result
from electronic and ionic conductivity, dipole orientation and
space charge polarization. The capacitance of the dielectric
is given by (1), where is the equivalent capacitance in the
vacuum of the insulation and is the relative permittivity or
dielectric constant
(1)
In Fig. 2(b), is defined as the loss angle, which represents
the dielectric energy losses in the insulation. is commonly
known as loss tangent or dissipation factor. is the power
factor of the dielectric. For a perfect dielectric, the loss is very
small ( 0); the current leads the applied voltage by 90 degrees.
During aging of the dielectric, the loss increases; therefore the
angle between the current vector and the applied voltage is less
than 90 degrees. The dissipation factor may also be expressed
as (2)
(2)
502
(a) (b)
Fig. 2. Equivalent circuit of a dielectric material. (a) Parallel equivalent circuit.
(b) Corresponding phasor diagram.
Fig. 3. r
Concentrated insulation model between the th turn and (
turn.
The dissipation factor is generally used for describing macro-
scopic properties of dielectric material. The energy dissipated
as heat in the dielectric is proportional to . The variation
of with the applied voltage is an important relation which
gives useful information about the quality of the insulation
and whether an imperfection exists in the insulation [15], [16].
Therefore, in the work reported in this paper, we investigated
the modeling of the deterioration of the insulation by varying
the dissipation factors to represent the different degradation
levels of the insulation. Then the equivalent resistance and
capacitance corresponding to the selected dissipation factor
were computed. These values represent the insulation at a
specific degradation level.
The equivalent resistance and capacitance of the insulation
between the adjacent turns can be calculated based on the ge-
ometry information and the material properties of the insulation.
Then a reasonable dissipation factor, which represents the
degrading degree of the insulation, is selected. Since the equiv-
alent capacitance, , changes little, the resistance in the equiv-
alent circuit of the insulation between two adjacent turns can be
computed by (3)
After the equivalent circuit of the insulation between the adja-
cent turns is obtained, the aging model of the insulation between
the th turn and ( )th turn can be illustrated as shown in
Fig. 3, where , .
B. Arcing Model
An arc is defined as a continuous luminous discharge of elec-
tricity across an insulating medium, usually accompanied by the
partial volatilization of the electrodes [17]. Arcs may develop
from a spark when arc tracking occurs across a partially conduc-
tive surface, such as damaged insulation. Once extinguished, an
arc requires a potential, known as the restrike voltage, to reignite
the arc. After an AC current becomes zero, the restrike voltage
establishes the potential needed to restrike the arc with the op-
posite polarity. From experimental results and analysis, Schurig
reported that the arc voltage is usually flap-topped and that the
magnitude of arcing fault currents ranged from 57% to 100% of
the available short-circuit current [18].
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 17, NO. 2, APRIL 2002
r + m)th Fig. 4. Arcing voltage and current.
(a) (b)
Fig. 5. Equivalent circuits of the arc (a) during the burning period (b) during
the extinction period.
The arcing characteristics are illustrated in Fig. 4. The figure
shows the simple case of arcing current and arcing voltage in a
resistive load circuit. The dotted line is the arcing current; the
solid line is the arcing voltage; the dash-dot line is the system
voltage. The arc ignites only after sufficient voltage is across
the gap. It extinguishes when voltage drops below that needed
to sustain the arc. Arcing voltage is almost a square wave, ex-
cept for the transient near current zero. In the figure, the magni-
tude of the square wave, is the voltage needed to sustain the
arc. The choppiness of the voltage trace indicates another dis-
tinct characteristic of the arc, that of a high-frequency voltage
source. In addition, arcing is random. Once it starts, it may be
interspersed with segments of normal current. The rms value of
(3) arc current and energy is less than that of a bolted fault.
For arcs of very small length, such as the arcing between two
turns of a transformer winding, a fixed back voltage opposing
the source is commonly used to represent the arc as shown in
Fig. 5 [19]. The equivalent circuit comprises a resistance and an
inductance that are functions of the arc length , its current ,
and the current’s rate of change with time . The above param-
eters can be experimentally obtained. Fig. 5(a) would apply for
both dc and ac circuits during periods when the arc is burning.
During periods of effective current zero, however, the arc can
be represented by a high resistance, , that increases with
time. In Fig. 5(b), represents the stray capacitance.
Since the insulation between the two layers or the two turns in
the windings is very thin, the resistance , inductance and the
stray capacitance in the equivalent circuit are small enough
to be ignored. Thus, the arcing model can be represented by the
equivalent circuit shown in Fig. 6. The voltage source is a
random square wave representing the equivalent arcing voltage.
S1 and S2 are time-controlled switches. If there is no arcing in
the circuit, S1 is closed and S2 is open, and the value of is
WANG AND BUTLER: MODELING TRANSFORMERS WITH INTERNAL INCIPIENT FAULTS
Fig. 6. Arcing model for incipient internal winding faults.
Fig. 7. Parallel combination model for the insulation.
TABLE I
SUMMARY OF VALUES OF VARIABLES DURING DIFFERENT PERIODS
zero. When equals to , the model represents arcing. When
S1 is closed and S2 is open, the arcing model is in the burning
period. Otherwise, when S1 is open and S2 is closed, the arcing
model is in the extinction period.
C. Combination Models
Fig. 7 represents the parallel combination model. Table I
shows the values of various parameters in the different periods
of this model. The parallel model represents a perfect insulation
when S1 and S2 are open; the value of is zero and
is a very large resistance so that the current in the insulation
is almost zero. To represent deteriorating insulation, is
decreased to a small value. When the random square wave is
zero, S1 and S2 are open. The model represents the nonarcing
deteriorating insulation. When the value of is , the model
represents the degrading insulation with arcing. In this case,
when S1 is closed and S2 is open, the model simulates the
burning period. If S1 is open and S2 is closed, it models the
extinction period.
The aging model and the arcing model can also be connected
in series into a series combination insulation model. In [20] the
simulation using the series combination insulation model was
discussed in more detail. Since the comparison between the sim-
ulation and the field test results showed the terminal character-
istics obtained from the parallel combination model were more
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503
TABLE II
PARAMETERS IN AGING MODEL FOR PRIMARY FAULT P15_55
similar to those from the field tests, this paper focuses on dis-
cussing the implementation of the parallel combination model
and the corresponding simulation results.
IV. IMPLEMENTATION AND SIMULATION RESULTS
A. Transformer Parameters
Simulations were carried out based on a custom-built 25 kVA,
60 Hz, single-phase, shell-form transformer used for field ex-
periments. The design data were as follows.
• The rated voltage ratio was 7200 V/240 V/120 V.
• The normal impedance was 1.75%, and normal reactance
was 1.62%.
• The turns ratio was 780/26.
• The primary winding was made of copper; the secondary
subwindings were made of aluminum.
• The insulation between the layers in the custom-built
transformer was made of Aramid paper.
The custom-built transformer was equipped with various taps
placed on both windings so that internal faults could be per-
formed by connecting two taps or connecting a tap to ground
[21].
B. Incipient Faults With Aging Model Only
Based on the transformer information listed above and the
modeling principles discussed in Section II, the parameters of
the equivalent circuit for the perfect insulation between two ad-
jacent turns of the transformer were calculated. According to
the literatures and previous experimental results, the equivalent
capacitance, , changes little. Therefore, we fix the equiva-
lent capacitance. Then, by changing , the different values
of for the various fault scenarios were computed using (3)
to represent the insulation in different degraded levels. For in-
stance, to simulate an incipient winding fault between the 15th
turn and the 55th turn on the primary winding, the parameters in
the insulation model for different deteriorated insulation levels
are shown in Table II. The equivalent capacitance for the insu-
lation between 15th and 55th turns was 89 nF. For the perfect
insulation of Aramid paper as shown in Case 1, the dissipation
factor, , was 0.006. Thus the calculated result for the equiv-
alent resistance was 49.0 M using (3). With the deterioration
of the insulation, the dissipation factor increased. When the dis-
sipation factor increased to 3 10 as shown in Case 11, the in-
sulation was broken down completely. Thus, according to the
similar method, the equivalent resistances for all of the cases
listed in Table II were calculated.
After the aging model was obtained, it was combined with
the FEA internal short circuit fault model to investigate the ter-
minal behaviors of the transformer when the insulation is de-
grading. When the incipient fault occurred between the 15th
504
(a)
(b)
Fig. 8. Terminal currents with the aging model to simulate primary incipient
fault. (a) Relationship between primary current and R . (b) Relationship
between secondary current and R .
and the 55th turns on the primary winding, the relationships be-
tween the RMS values of primary current and secondary cur-
rent in one power cycle and the resistance are illustrated in
Fig. 8(a) and (b). From the plots, some conclusions were ob-
tained. First, when was larger than 10 , the primary cur-
rent was very close to the transformer rated values. In other
words, the transformer was in good condition. When was
less than 0.01 , the primary current was approximately equal to
the internal short circuit current. Namely, an internal short-cir-
cuit fault occurred in the transformer. When the value of was
in the range of [0.01, 10], the primary current changed between
the rated current and the short circuit current value. That shows
an incipient fault occurred in the transformer. Second, the sec-
ondary voltage and current were almost at the rated values when
an incipient internal winding fault existed in the transformer.
Fig. 9(a) and (b) show the relationships between the RMS
values of primary current and secondary current in one power
cycle and the resistance when the incipient fault occurred
between the tenth and the 13th turns on the secondary winding.
Similarly, when was larger than 1 , the primary current was
very close to the rated values and the transformer was in good
condition. When was less than 0.0001 , the primary current
was approximately equal to the internal short circuit current and
an internal short-circuit fault occurred in the transformer. When
the value of increased from 0.0001 to 1 , the primary
current decreased from the short circuit current to the rated cur-
rent. That shows an incipient fault occurred in the transformer.
Also, when the resistance decreased, i.e., the insulation was
deteriorating, the secondary voltage and current decreased from
their normal values.
C. Incipient Fault With Aging and Arcing Models
After the aging model and arcing model were implemented,
they were combined into a combination model for the insulation
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 17, NO. 2, APRIL 2002
(a)
(b)
Fig. 9. Terminal voltage and currents with the aging model to simulate
secondary incipient fault. (a) Relationship between primary current and R .
(b) Relationship between secondary current and R .
and paralleled with the internal short circuit fault model in the
Maxwell Spice, as shown in Fig. 7. The aging model and the
arcing model connected in parallel were used to investigate ter-
minal voltages and currents, and the circulating current flowing
through the insulation model when the insulation was degrading
and the arcing phenomena appeared.
For the case where the insulation resistance, , in the par-
allel model was 0.1 (i.e., the dissipation factor is equal
to 3 10 ), and the waveforms of and the time sequences
to control S1 and S2 in Fig. 7 were as shown in Fig. 10, respec-
tively, the waveforms of primary current ( ), secondary cur-
rent ( ) and the circulating current ( ) are shown in Fig. 11. In
Fig. 10, the arcing voltage is 260 V. When the time sequence is
1, the controlled switch is on; if it is 0, the switch is off.
In Fig. 11, when there was no arcing, for instance, at time
s, the primary current and circulating current were
very large and close to the short circuit current level for this
case. When arcing occurred, such as at time s, the
primary current and the circulating current was less than the
internal short circuit current values. During the full time frame
of the case, the secondary current did not change much.
To investigate more characteristics of the arcing from trans-
former incipient faults, the waveforms of the primary current
were investigated in the frequency domain. Since the frequency
domain of the secondary current was dominated by 60 Hz com-
ponent, only the frequency characteristics of primary current
are discussed in this section. In addition, because the funda-
mental component, 60 Hz, is so large that other frequency com-
ponents are hardly seen, the primary current was filtered by a
simulated digital 60 Hz notch filter before the FFT analysis was
performed. In the simulation, the sampling rate was 3840 Hz. A
64-point FFT was performed over one power cycle.
Fig. 12 shows the frequency spectrum of the primary current
at time of 0.025 s when parallel combination model was used
to simulate the incipient fault between the 15th and 55th turns
on the primary winding. The waveforms in time domain for this
case were shown in Fig. 11. In this case, the insulation resistance
WANG AND BUTLER: MODELING TRANSFORMERS WITH INTERNAL INCIPIENT FAULTS 505

(a)
(a)

(b)
(b)

(c) (c)

Fig. 10. Waveforms of E(t) and time sequences to control S1 and S2 for Fig. 11. Terminal currents and circulating current for the transformer with an
P15_55. (a) Waveform of E (t). (b) Time sequence to control S1. (c) Time incipient internal fault between the 15th and the 55th turns on primary winding
sequence to control S2. (R = 0.1 ). (a) Primary current. (b) Secondary current. (c) Circulating
current.

in the insulation model was 0.1 . The current harmonic compo-

nents were concentrated in the lower frequencies below 960 Hz.
Of these frequency components, the odd harmonics were the
dominant frequencies accounting for 29% of the total primary
current, respectively. The even harmonics comprised only 8%
of the primary current. The dc component comprised 6% of the
total primary current. The fundamental 60 Hz component in the
filtered primary current comprised only 4% of the total primary
current.
Similarly, the parallel combination model of the insulation
Fig. 12. Frequency analysis of primary current for the transformer with an
was used to model an incipient winding fault between the 10th incipient internal fault between the 15th and 55th turns on the primary winding
and 13th turns on the secondary winding. Fig. 13 shows the (R = 0.1 , t = 0:025 s).
waveforms of and time sequences to control switch S1 and
S2 in this case. primary winding and faulted turns. The secondary current de-
Fig. 14 presents waveforms of terminal currents and the cir- creased during arcing.
culating current when the resistance in the aging model was Fig. 15 shows the spectrum of the primary current at time of
0.1 and the dissipation factor is equal to 5.4 10 . At 0.025 s in the case shown in Fig. 14(a). In the scenario, a sec-
time s, the waveform shows no arcing. The insula- ondary incipient fault was simulated between the tenth and 13th
tion was in the aging phase so that the primary current and sec- turns with the insulation resistance of 0.1 . The spectrum
ondary current were higher than the normal rated current. At of the primary current shows that the third harmonic was the
the same time, a small circulating current flowed in the faulty dominant harmonic, accounting for approximately 25% of the
turns. During the arcing period, for instance, at time peak value of the total primary current at s. The spec-
s, the waveform shows large pulse currents flowed through the trum shown in Fig. 15 showed 39% was concentrated in the odd

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506 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 17, NO. 2, APRIL 2002

(a) (a)

(b) (b)

(c)
Fig. 13. Waveforms of E(t) and time sequences to control S1 and S2 for
(c)
S10_13. (a) Waveform of E (t). (b) Time sequence to control S1. (c) Time Fig. 14. Terminal currents and circulating current for the transformer with an
sequence to control S2. incipient internal fault between the tenth and 13th turn on the secondary winding
(R = 0.1 ).
harmonics and 11% in the even harmonics. The remaining 50%
was the fundamental 60 Hz component which were filtered out
before the FFT analysis. Since the dc offset of the primary cur-
rent was small, the dc component in the spectrum was small.
Compared with the spectrum shown in Fig. 12, the percentage
of third harmonics shown in Fig. 12 is more distinct. This is be-
cause the deterioration levels of the insulation in the two cases
were different. When resistance was 0.1 W and the dissi-
pation factor was equal to 5.4 10 , the deterioration of
the insulation between tenth and 13th turns on the secondary
winding was not very severe. Thus, the primary current during Fig. 15. Frequency analysis of primary current for the transformer with an
arcing period is larger than that in nonarcing period. So the spec- incipient internal fault between tenth th and 13th turns on the secondary winding
trum shows a large third harmonics. However in the case shown (R = 0.1 , t = 0:025 s).
in Fig. 12, , was equal to 3 10 for the same . Thus the
deterioration of the insulation between 15th and 55th turns on of the experimental methodology for staging incipient faults is
the primary winding was very severe. This leads to the result that still ongoing. However, it was noticed at some point during the
the primary current during nonarcing period was larger than the short circuit field tests that the tests were conveying arcing phe-
primary current in arcing period. Therefore, the spectrum shows nomena. Recordings of the field experiments were analyzed for
a large fundamental component. the purpose of characterizing the incipient-like behaviors of the
transformers. The characteristics from the field tests were com-
D. Comparison With Incipient-Like Behavior During Field pared with the characteristics obtained from the simulations.
Experiments In the experiments, the transformer was supplied by a
Internal short circuit winding fault field experiments were single-phase lateral distribution line through a fuse and an oil
performed on the custom-built transformer at Texas A&M Uni- switch. Considering the excessive and dangerous levels of the
versity Downed Conductor Test Facility [20]. The development circulating current, the turns were shorted through a fuse. The

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WANG AND BUTLER: MODELING TRANSFORMERS WITH INTERNAL INCIPIENT FAULTS
(a)
(b)
(c)
Fig. 16. Terminal currents for field test internal short circuit fault between
the tenth and 13th turns on the secondary winding. (a) Primary current.
(b) Secondary current. (c) Circulating current.
primary voltage, secondary voltage, secondary current, primary
current and circulating current were stepped down by potential
transformers (PT), current transformers (CT), and an interface
box for monitoring by a computer acquisition system.
Using the experimental setup in [21], 109 internal short cir-
cuit fault tests were performed over a two-year period. After 20
months and 94 internal short circuit fault tests, some phenomena
appearing during the experiments indicated that the transformer
was in the deteriorating condition. For instance, a buzzing sound
was heard in some experiments, a smell was noticeable, and
arcing-like phenomena was observed in the waveforms of the
recorded signals. This suggests that at some location or loca-
tions in the transformer, the insulation was severely degraded.
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507
Fig. 17. Frequency spectrum of the notch filtered primary current (t = 28:9 s).
At this point, a series of load and short circuit tests were per-
formed on two separate days to determine where the deterio-
rating insulation was located. During the load tests, contrary to
expectations, arcing-like phenomena appeared. Finally at some
point during tests on the third day, the transformer windings
burst out of the transformer casing during a turn-to-earth fault
between the 15th turn on the primary winding and ground.
The first fault scenario in which arcing apparently was
shown was a secondary short circuit fault between the tenth
and 13th turns, which represented the 95th field test. When
the experiment was performed, a smell was emitted by the
transformer winding, which was noticeable from the observa-
tion deck about 10 m from the transformer. The time domain
waveforms of primary current, secondary current and circu-
lating current are plotted in Fig. 16(a)–(c), respectively. The
transformer was energized at about 5 s and the internal short
circuit fault was introduced at about 28.7 s. Fig. 16 shows the
waveforms in the time frame of [28.8, 29.2] s when arcing
was very active.
In the normal condition, the peak value of the primary cur-
rent should be around 5 A. If a solid, internal short circuit is
introduced between the tenth and 13th turns, the peak value of
the primary current should be about 30 A. However, in this case,
the peak value of the primary current was about 10 A. The wave-
form of unfiltered signal indicates the arcing discharge appeared
in some part of the transformer winding. Fig. 16(b) shows the
secondary current; in this case, the secondary current decreased
during the time when arcing occurred, which suggested the insu-
lation on the secondary winding was degrading. The circulating
current shown in Fig. 16(c) shows some characteristics similar
to the simulation results obtained from the incipient fault model
in Fig. 14(c). The random large current sparks indicate the in-
sulation in the transformer winding were in a degrading condi-
tion. Thus, some arcing discharge appeared in the transformer
winding and conveyed itself in the terminal currents and the cir-
culating current. From the waveforms, it is supposed that the
deterioration of the insulation was in its beginning period since
the primary current, secondary current were approximately the
normal values and circulating current was almost zero in the
nonarcing period.
Fig. 17 shows the FFT of one power cycle after the fault
for the primary current through a 60 Hz notch filter when
arcing phenomena appeared between the tenth and 13th turns
on the secondary winding at time 28.9 s in Fig. 16. The result
shows that the notch filtered primary current was composed of
frequency components below 360 Hz. Of the low-frequency
508
current harmonics components, the third harmonic comprised
45% of the magnitude of the notch-filtered primary current.
The small dc component in the spectrum matched the small dc
offset in the primary current. The frequency spectrum shows
that 55% of the notch filtered primary current was concentrated
in the odd harmonics and 6% in the even harmonics comprised
The percentage of odd harmonics was much larger than the
even harmonics. This characteristic matched the simulation
result shown in Fig. 15.
The analysis of the experimental results [21] shows that
when the insulation was deteriorating to some point, arcing
phenomena would appear and could be monitored in the
primary current, secondary current and circulating current.
The waveforms in time domain showed that arcing current
composed of two periods, arcing burning period and arcing
extinction period. During the burning period, big current sparks
often occurred in the primary current and circulating current.
The magnitudes of arcing currents were less than the values of
current during internal short circuit faults. During the extinction
period, the circulating current was close to zero and primary
current was close to the normal current. In the frequency
domain, the frequency components were concentrated in the
low frequencies below 960 Hz. In the harmonic components,
the percentage of odd harmonics was larger than that of even
harmonics as shown in Fig. 15. The results from the simulations
using the internal incipient fault model presented in this paper
showed similar characteristics.
V. CONCLUSIONS
This paper presented a new transformer model to simulate an
internal incipient winding fault. The new transformer model was
implemented by combining deteriorating insulation model with
a finite element analysis internal short circuit fault model. The
new deteriorating insulation model, which includes an aging
model and an arcing model, was developed based on the phys-
ical behavior of aging insulation and the arcing phenomena oc-
curring when the insulation was severely damaged. The aging
model and the arcing model of the insulation were connected in
parallel to produce a parallel combination insulation model. The
parallel combination insulation model was combined with the
internal short circuit model to predict the terminal voltages and
currents of the transformer under various incipient fault condi-
tions. The characteristics of the terminal currents and circulating
current in the faulted winding were analyzed in time domain and
frequency domain.
Some incipient-like fault cases obtained from internal short
circuit field tests were also analyzed in time domain and
frequency domain. The comparisons between the incipient-like
fault experimental test cases and simulation results showed
that terminal behaviors of the faulted transformer obtained
from the field tests show some similar characteristics to those
from simulations using the parallel combination model. In
future work, the incipient fault transformer model will be used
to generate a database of incipient internal winding faults in
distribution transformers for the development of intelligent
transformer fault detection techniques.
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 17, NO. 2, APRIL 2002
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors highly appreciate P. Palmer-Buckle for providing
the experimental results and ANSOFT technical support per-
sonnel, M. Christini, for his assistance.
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WANG AND BUTLER: MODELING TRANSFORMERS WITH INTERNAL INCIPIENT FAULTS
Hang Wang (S’97) received the B.S. and M.S. degrees from Tsinghua Univer-
sity, Beijing, China, in 1994 and 1997, respectively, and the Ph.D. degree from
the Department of Electrical Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Sta-
tion, in May 2001.
She is currently a Research Assistant with the Power System Automation
Laboratory at Texas A&M. Her research focuses on incipient fault detection in
single-phase, distribution transformers.
Dr. Wang is a student member of the IEEE Power Engineering Society.
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509
Karen L. Butler (SM’02) received the B.S. degree from Southern University,
Baton Rouge, LA, in 1985, the M.S. degree from the University of Texas, Austin,
in 1987, and the Ph.D. degree from Howard University, Washington, DC, in
1994, all in electrical engineering.
She is an Assistant Professor with the Department of Electrical Engineering,
Texas A&M University, College Station. From 1988 to 1989, she was a Member
of Technical Staff at Hughes Aircraft Co., Culver City, CA. Her research focuses
on the areas of computer and intelligent systems applications in power, power
distribution automation, and modeling and simulation of power systems and
vehicles.
Dr. Butler received an NSF Early Career Award in 1996 and an Office of
Naval Research Young Investigator Award in 1999. She is a member of the IEEE
Power Engineering Society and the Louisiana Engineering Society. She is a Reg-
istered Professional Engineer in the states of Louisiana, Texas, and Mississippi.