Online Monitoring of Insulator Failure Using Micro Electric-field Sensor

Insulators are important parts of transmission lines. During operation, the failure of an insulator unit will affect the reliability of the insulator string, even causes power interruption. However, it is difficult for operation and maintenance personnel to find the failed insulator unit. When an insulator unit fails, the internal electric field of other insulator units will change. Therefore, the fault of the insulator string can be monitored and diagnosed by monitoring the electric field inside the first insulator unit. Electric field sensors are equipment for the measurement of space electric field with small size and low cost, which can be arranged inside the insulators. Based on micro electric field sensor, this paper conducts simulations and experiments on glass insulators. The results show that by arranging an electric field sensor inside the first insulator unit, it can realize online failure monitoring of insulators.