Comparative research of oil-paper aging characteristics under thermal stress and combined thermo-electrical stresses

During the operation of power transformer, its oil-paper insulation is continuously subjected to various stresses, e.g., the thermal, electrical, mechanical, and chemical stresses, which cause insulation aging gradually. It has been considered that the combined thermal and electrical stresses are the most important and unavoidable factors that induce insulation materials aging. In this work, accelerated aging experiments of oil-impregnated pressboards under combined thermal (130°C) and electrical stresses (4 kV/mm) are performed, while the aging experiments under single thermal stress are also carried out at the corresponding temperature (130°C). The electrical and physic-chemical properties of oil, including dielectric losses factor tanδ, resistivity, acid value and pH value etc., are measured during the aging process. Dissolved gasses in oil and polymerization degree of cellulose are also measured. The relationship between these properties of oil-paper insulation and aging time is investigated. The results show that dissolved gases in oil, resistivity, tanδ of oil under combined thermal and electrical stresses are obviously different from that under thermal stress during aging process while some other properties show similar changing trend. For cellulose, compared with the single thermal aging results, it even shows a slower degradation rate in the presence of electrical stress.