TRANSFORMER NO LOAD LOSSES BASIC INFORMATION
What Are The Transformer No Load Losses?
Alternating magnetic flux produces both hysteresis losses and eddy-current losses in the steel. As we have seen, hysteresis losses depend on several factors including the frequency, the peak flux density, the type of core steel used, and the orientation of the flux with respect to the ‘‘grain’’ of the steel.
All of the above factors, except the frequency, are under the control of the transformer designer. Core losses are sometimes referred to as iron losses and are commonly referred to as no load losses, because core losses do not require load currents.
Decreasing the induced voltage per turn can reduce the peak flux density. This obviously involves increasing the numbers of turns in both the primary and secondary windings in order to maintain the same transformer turns ratio.
The disadvantage of adding more turns is that this increases the length of conductor and increases the conductor resistance. More cross sectional area is required in order to keep the resistance constant.
Doubling the number of turns requires about four times the volume of copper. Another way of reducing core losses is to use various types of low-loss core steels that are now available, including ‘‘amorphous’’ core materials, which have extremely low losses and superior magnetic properties.
Unfortunately, amorphous core materials have ceramic-like properties, so fabricating transformer cores with these materials is much more difficult than with laminated steel cores.
With grain-oriented steel, the direction of the core flux must be kept more or less parallel to the grain of the steel by mitering the corners of the laminations where the flux changes direction by 90°. Since the flux will cross the grain at about a 45° angle at the mitered edges, the hysteresis losses will increase somewhat in these places.
These additional localized core losses must be factored into the calculation of the total core losses. Building up the core with thin laminated strips controls eddy losses in the core, each strip having an oxide film applied to the surface.
The oxide film is extremely thin and it is more like a high-resistance film than true electrical insulation; but since the potential differences between adjacent laminations is quite small, the resistance of the oxide film is very effective in breaking up the eddy current paths.
During the manufacture of the core, the core cutting machine must not be allowed to get dull; otherwise, ‘‘burrs’’ will form along the edges of the laminations. Burrs are imperfections that form electrical bridges between the laminations and create paths for eddy currents and increased losses.
Sometimes the eddy currents near a burr can be large enough to cause localized overheating that can actually cause core damage. Core losses are approximately proportional to the square of the excitation voltage E applied to the transformer.
Therefore, placing an equivalent linear conductance Gm across the transformer terminals can approximate transformer core losses. The core losses are expressed by Wm = E^2Gm
No comments:
Post a Comment