Noise rejection and partial discharge identification in PDIV tests of insulated wires under repetitive impulse supply voltage

Partial discharge (PD) detection is a fundamental test for the design and diagnosis of insulation systems, particularly organic materials which must operate throughout their whole life without PD. The measurement of Partial Discharge Inception Voltage (PDIV) and Repetitive Partial Discharge Inception Voltage (RPDIV), the latter defined for power electronic-type supply, is therefore a key issue for the design and qualification tests of Type I insulation system of rotating machines fed by power converters. While experience and technology for PD inception measurements under sinusoidal voltage supply is well established, the same does not hold under repetitive-pulse voltage waveforms, such as those provided by inverters. In addition, electromagnetic noise generated by electronic switch commutation can overlap with PD pulses signals and this is even more cumbersome when fast rise-time components are employed, such as GaN or SiC semiconductors. Moreover, this is also the condition which is the most stressful for stator wire insulation. This work investigates methods to detect PD pulses on enameled wires, rejecting noise efficiently, under repetitive impulsive voltages with different rise times, from 60 ns to 1000 ns. The proposed techniques can be implemented to achieve un-supervised noise rejection, which would be an important goal for both off-line and on-line PD testing.