[PART-

B]
GENERATION OF
Unit
IMPULSE
5
VOLTAGE AND
CURRENT

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What is impulse
voltage??
• Impulse voltage is a unidirectional voltage.
• No appreciable oscillation.
• It rises rapidly to a maximum value and
falls more or less rapidly to zero.
• A unidirectional voltage that rapidly rises to
a peak value and then drops to zero more
or less rapidly. Also known as pulse voltage.

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Why Impulse
Voltage?
•To study the effect of transient overvoltages
generated by lightning or swiching
operations on the system.

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 Representation of Impulse
Wave

t0 t1 t
10
t2 3
Wave front = 1.5*(t2-t1) t2 is the time taken to reach 90% of
Wave tail= t3-t0 peak value

t1 is the time taken to reach 10% of peak

value

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What is impulse voltage??
Contd…
• Maximum value is called peak value
of impulse voltage.
• If an impulse voltage develops without
causing flashover or puncture is called
full impulse voltage.
• Due to flash over or puncture sudden
collapse of impulse voltage will occur and it
is called as chopped impulse voltage.

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Wave front & Wave
tail
• A full impulse voltage consists of both wave
front
and wave tail.
• Wave front- Time taken by the wave to reach
its maximum value starting from zero value.
- difficulty to identify the wave front
- wave front is considered as 1.5 times (t2-t1)
- where t2 is the time taken to reach 90% of
peak value
-t1 is the time taken to reach 10% of peak
value
- (t2-t1) is about 80% of wave front time 6
Wave front & Wave
tail
• Wave tail- Time measured between the
nominal starting point t0 and the point on
the wave tail where the voltage is 50% of
peak value.
- wave tail time (t3-t0)

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Important Definitions Related to
Impulse Voltage (Types of
impulse Voltage)
[Link] wave
-If an impulse voltage is applied to a piece of
insulation a flash over or puncture occur and
sudden collapse of impulse voltage is called
chopped wave.
-if the chopping takes place front part of the wave is
called front chopped wave
[Link] puncture voltage
-Peak value of impulse voltage which cause the
puncture of the material.
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Important Definitions Related to
Impulse Voltage Contd…
3. Impulse flash over voltage
-When impulse voltage applied to the
insulating material flash over may or may
not occur.
-If the flashover occur more than 50% of
number of applications , then it is called as
impulse flash over voltage.
-Impulse flash over voltage depends polarity,
duration of wave front & wave tail and
nature of material.
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IMPULSE
GENERATOR

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What is impulse
generator?
• An impulse generator is an electrical
apparatus which produces very short
high- voltage or high-current surges.
• It can be classified into two types a)
impulse voltage generators & b) impulse
current generators.

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Basic impulse
generator

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Why impulse
Generator?
• Impulse generator produce high impulse
voltage.
• High impulse voltages are used to test the
strength of electric power equipment
against lightning and switching surges.
• impulse voltages are some times used in
nuclear physics experiments.
• High impulse currents are needed for tests
on equipment such as lightning arresters.
Fuse testing.
• Technical applications such as lasers,
thermonuclear fusion, and ......... 13
Basic impulse
generator
• An impulse generator essentially consists of a capacitor
which is charged to the required voltage and
discharged through a circuit.
• The circuit parameters can be adjusted to give an
impulse voltage of the desired shape.
• Cs is charged from a dc source until the
spark gap G breaks down.
• The voltage is then impressed upon the object under test
of capacitance Cb.
• The wave shaping resistors Rd and Re control the front
and tail of the impulse voltage available across Cb
respectively.
• Overall the wave shape is determined by the values of the
generator capacitance (Cs) and the load capacitance(Cb),
and the wave control resistances Rd and Re. 14
Basic impulse
generator
• The output voltage waveform can be defined
by

• where, v(t) instantaneous output voltage, Vo

DC charging voltage, roots of the
characteristics equation, which depends on
the parameters of the generator. where

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Classification of Impulse Voltage
Generator

1. Single Stage Impulse

Generator

[Link] Stage Impulse

Generator
(Marx generator)
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Single stage Impulse
Generator Circuit
External elements, waveform
control

Wave duration control

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Importance of each elements in
impulse generator circuit
1. Capacitor (C1)-
• C1 is the capacitance of generator
charged from a dc source to a suitable
voltage.
• It will discharge through the space gap.
• If the generator is single stage C1 is
enough.
• In the case of multistage impulse generator
group of capacitor connected in parallel
and discharged in series.
Ujir 26
e
Importance of each elements in
impulse generator circuit contd………
2. Inductor(L1)
-inductance of the generator
-The leads of inductor is connecting to
the generator
3. Resistor (R1)
-Damping purpose

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Importance of each elements in
impulse generator circuit contd………
4.L3 and R3
-external elements
-control shape
5.R2 and R4
-Control the waveform duration
-R4 serve as a potential divider
6.C2 and C4
-Capacitance to the earth of high voltage components and
leads
7.C4
-Includes the capacitance of the test object
-load capacitance
-Hold the voltage to produce required value of wave shape 20
Expression for output impulse
voltage for impulse generator

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Multistage Impulse
Generator
Introduction
• To obtain higher and higher impulse voltage.
• In 1923 E. Marx suggested a multiplier circuit which
is commonly used to obtain impulse voltage with
as high a peak value as possible for a given charging
dc voltage.
• Depending upon the charging voltage available and
output voltage required “the number of identical
impulse capacitors are charged in parallel and
then discharged in series”.
• Obtain total charging voltage multiplied with
number of stages.
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Multistage Impulse
Generator
Why Multistage Impulse Generator???????
• A single capacitor C1 is may be used for
voltages up to 200 kV. Beyond this voltage,
a single capacitor & charging unit may be
too costly & the size becomes very large.

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Multistage Impulse Generator
Circuit
Schematic Diagram of Multistage Impulse
Generator

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Multistage Impulse Generator
Circuit
• Rs is a charging resistance to limit the charging
current.
• The generator capacitance C is chosen such that
the product of CRs is about 10s to 1 min.
• The gap spacing is chosen such that the breakdown
voltage of the gap G is greater than the charging
voltage V.
• All the capacitance are charged to the voltage V in
about
1 minute.
• Charging time constant=CRs (in seconds)
• Discharging time constant = CR1/n (in micro seconds) 25
, where n is the number of stages.
Multistage Impulse
Generator

A 16 stage Multistage Impulse Generator having a stage capacitance of 0.280μF

And maximum charging voltage 300kV .
The height of the generator will be about
15m. Area = 3.25m x 3.00 m
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THANK
YOU

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