Chapter 1: Introduction

1.1 Introduction
1.1.1 Background of study
One of the main concerns of any power utilities is the quality of the power
supplied to the customers, as these customers demanded an uninterrupted supply with
a minimum case of disruption. By addressing these concerns, the power utilities can
reduce the cost related in generating, transmitting, distributing and maintaining the
power system. There are several measures that have been taken to rectify these
problems, such as by employing voltage regulator, capacitor and dc stored energy. In
this paper, focus is being given to the power transformer with tap changer on-load and
off-load. The former is preferable, as there is no disconnection of the power
transformer when changing the tap setting, thus the operation of supplying the load
demand is remained uninterrupted. Lately, online monitoring of power transformer
has become of interest to the power utilities, as the power transformer is one of the
most expensive single elements of the high voltage transmission system.
On-load tap changer power transformers are an essential part of any modern
power system, since they allow voltages to be maintained at desired levels despite the
load changes. Although the first on-load tap changers were developed in the early part
of this century, modern versions still have not altered radically from these designs and
in essence, they are complex mechanical device.
The application of semiconductor or solid state devices in designing the tap changer
have the advantage of faster response, almost virtually maintenance free and better
performance in term of power quality when compared to its conventional counterpart.
The only setback of solid-state devices is cost efficiency and high conduction loss.
Furthermore, as solid-state devices must be permanently connected in the circuit,
some sort of protection against high voltage surges travelling down the transformer
winding is required.
Protection against fault in power systems (PS) is very essential and vital for
reliable performance. A power system is said to be faulty when an undesirable
condition occurs in that power system, where the undesirable condition might be short
circuits, overcurrent, overvoltage etc.
The power transformer is one of the most significant equipment in the electric
power system, and transformer protection is an essential part of the general system
protection approach. Transformers are used in a wide variety of applications, from


small distribution transformers serving one or more users to very large units that are
an integral part of the bulk power system.
Moreover with the increasing population and their unavoidable demands, leads
to the high increase demands on electrical power. With this increase in demand of
power, the existing systems may become overloaded. The overloading at the
consumer end appears at the transformer terminals which can affect its efficiency and
protection systems. One of the reported damage or tripping of the distribution
transformer is due to thermal overload. To escape the damaging of transformer due to
overloading from consumer end, it involves the control against overcurrent tripping of
distribution transformer. Where the technology of the day has given the opportunity to
use the latest trends, and microprocessor, microcontrollers are one of the day
requirements to apply in the remote protection of the transformer.
The purpose of power system protection is to detect faults or abnormal
operating conditions and to initiate corrective action. Relays must be able to evaluate
a wide variety of parameters to establish that corrective action is required. Obviously,
a relay cannot prevent the fault. Its primary purpose is to detect the fault and take the
necessary action to minimize the damage to the equipment or to the system. The most
common parameters which reflect the presence of a fault are the voltages and
currentsat the terminals of the protected apparatus or at the appropriate zone
boundaries. The Protective relays require reasonably accurate reproduction of the
abnormal and normal conditions in the power system for correct sensing and
operation. This information input from the power systems are usually through Current
Transformer (CT) and Voltage Transformer (VT).
Furthermore, for the past several years fuse, circuit breakers and
electromechanical relays were used for the protection of power systems. The
traditional protective fuses and electrometrical relays present several draw backs.
Therefore a proposed solution is chosen to develop a microcontroller based
transformer overload protection prototype because the microprocessors based relays
provides greater flexibility, more adjustable characteristics, increased range of setting,
high accuracy, reduced size, and lower costs, along with many ancillary functions,
such as control logic, event recording, fault location data, remote setting, self-
monitoring and checking, etc.
In this project, the improvement is concentrated on maintaining the voltage
supply by changing tap setting via microcontroller through realy. The results obtained


from this experiment show that the proposed microcontroller tap changer is able to
monitor the voltage supply and maintain it within the specified range.
Power transformers equipped with on-load tap changers (OLTCs) have been
the main components of electrical networks and industrial applications for nearly 90
years. OLTCs enable voltage regulation and/or phase shifting by varying the
transformer ratio under load without interruption.

1.1.2 Problem statement
An essential concern in transformer protection is the high cost of the
transformer and the relative long outage time that occurs when a large transformer
fails. The proper type of protection can often detect initial faults before they become
major, and thereby prevent major physical damage and long outage times.
Transformers experiences faults which leads to deterioration and acceleration
aging and failure of transformer winding resulting from insulation failures, one of the
causes is the over current. Due to overload and externally applied conditions
including over current and external short circuit causes rise in temperature of both
transformer oil and windings.
Transformers must not be subjected to prolong overvoltage. For maximum
efficiency they are operated near the knee of their saturation curve, so at voltages
above 110% of rated, the exciting current becomes very high. Just a few percent
increase in voltage results in a very large increase in current. These large currents can
destroy the unit if they are not reduced promptly.
However engineers and scientist have worked out various ways in which the
transformer can be protected; one of such ways is by using a relay. Therefore in order
to protect the transformer using relay, a control system idea is developed through the
use of microcontroller, hence the name of the project.
1.3 Aim and objective
Aim:
The aim of this project is to design and implement a microcontroller based
transformer protection system.
Objective:
1. To design the current and voltage sensing circuits that will be interfaced to
the microcontroller for monitoring


2.To develop an algorithm and codes to the microcontroller which will work
for under over current, over voltage, under voltage conditions and transmit the
parameters to a personal computer.
3. To analyze and validate the performance of this system using appropriate
simulation software.

1.1.4 Research scope
The overall aim of the study is to build a microcontroller based transformer
protection with transformer parameters monitoring capabilities. This protection is
based on the transformer parameters fed into the ADC of the microcontroller and
monitoring the transformer parameters through PC. Immediately a fault is detected the
microcontroller taking necessary action.
Furthermore, the limitation of the entire project is divided into two. First part of
the project is to design and build the hardware of the entire system. Where a voltage
transformer of 230:160 VAC, current sensor, electromechanical relay,
microcontroller, LCD display, and finally a power supply that can generate 5VDC in
order to activate the relay circuit, the microcontroller and LCD. The second part is the
development of a C language program that will satisfy the protection of the
transformer algorithm. Correspondingly, the system development will also
concentrate on elaborating and designing a suitable transmitter module using
microcontroller based circuit. An AVR microcontroller was selected for this project
because of its universal synchronous asynchronous receiver and transmitter (USART),
inbuilt ADC functionalities etc. Finally, the highest priority is given to the software
design and implementation in order to develop a suitable algorithm that will promptly
interact with the, microcontroller and the personal computer.



3. Transformer Failures
Failures in transformers can be classified into
winding failures due to short circuits (turn-turn faults, phase-phase faults, phase-
ground, open winding)
core faults (core insulation failure, shorted laminations)
terminal failures (open leads, loose connections, short circuits)


on-load tap changer failures (mechanical, electrical, short circuit, overheating)





LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

2.1 Literature Review
Enormous work has been done on protection of power transformers such as:
overload voltages, overcurrent and external short-circuit etc. Some of those researches
which had been conducted, their setbacks, ambiguities and merits are as discussed in
the subsequent paragraphs. The transformer internal fault (short circuit) protection
function was the functionality of the differential relay. The performance of the
proposed relay was tested for internal, external faults and inrush current of the
transformer. In their project the digital differential relaying scheme comprised of filter,
pre-process, data acquisition system and a decision maker. The protective relay
performs the duty of making decision about the faulted or non-faulted situations.
The transformer internal faults and the external faults situations were tested on the
designed differential relay, and the results of these test illustrates the efficiency of the
system.
The performance of the proposed system had been examined with three
various types of loading which had been added to the transformer. From the
experimental observations it was understood that, the proposed system monitors and
controls the transformer in an efficient manner. Whenever an over current was sensed
by the system while monitoring the transformer, it directs the main station to shut
down the transformer and thus it guards the unit from any serious damages.
Larner et al presented a paper that attempts to review the concept of a fuse application
on high voltage Power transformers. The practical connecting of a power transformer
directly to a transmission line through fuse was discussed and was found that the fuse
presents several problems in the protection. One of the stated problem that a fuse is
that it cannot detect a fault current resulting from turn-to turn faults within the
protected transformer which can be well below the load current rating of the
transformer.


From the above review, it is finally concluded that researches done on
thetransformer protection have some weaknesses; therefore by using the proposed
method,which is by using microcontroller based approach, the protection will be
enhanced to abetter protection because the application of microcontroller in protecting
transformeragainst overcurrent and over voltage is speedily growing.