COMPEL - The international journal for computation and mathematics

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Electromagnetic modelling of short circuited coreplates
Jean-Yves Roger Emmanuel Vrignaud Thomas Henneron Abdelkader Benabou Jean-Pierre Ducreux
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Jean-Yves Roger Emmanuel Vrignaud Thomas Henneron Abdelkader Benabou Jean-Pierre Ducreux,
(2009),"Electromagnetic modelling of short circuited coreplates", COMPEL - The international journal for
computation and mathematics in electrical and electronic engineering, Vol. 28 Iss 3 pp. 762 - 771
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COMPEL
28,3
762
Downloaded by New York University At 01:01 17 June 2015 (PT)
COMPEL: The International Journal
for Computation and Mathematics in
Electrical and Electronic Engineering
Vol. 28 No. 3, 2009
pp. 762-771
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0332-1649
DOI 10.1108/03321640910941016
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0332-1649.htm
Electromagnetic modelling
of short circuited coreplates
Jean-Yves Roger and Emmanuel Vrignaud
LAMEL-EDF R&D, Département THEMIS, Clamart, France
Thomas Henneron and Abdelkader Benabou
LAMEL-L2EP, Bât. P2, Villeneuve d’Ascq, France, and
Jean-Pierre Ducreux
LAMEL-EDF R&D, Département THEMIS, Clamart, France
Abstract
Purpose – Coreplates in large generators may suffer from local short circuits. An accurate analysis is
required to avoid these failures and detect them when occurring. The purpose of this paper is to
develop a lamination stack model compliant with interlamination default analysis.
Design/methodology/approach – An electromagnetic model should account for the eddy-current
in the lamination stack. To avoid the modelling of the insulation between the steel sheets, the authors
propose to introduce a condition on the fields applied between each sheet. In the case of electric fault
between several sheets, the conducting domain, i.e. the sheets, is not simply connected. Then, T-V
formulation must be adapted to solve such problem.
Findings – The model allows to account for thin plates, insulating layers and electrical faults in
electromagnetic modeling of core plates. This study leads to a first evaluation of eddy current losses in
steel laminations with defaults.
Research limitations/implications – The present study does not take into account thermal
effects. The next step will consist in a magneto-thermal computation. Thus, an electromagnetic finite
element software must be coupled with a thermal one. An other improvement will rely on the study of
actual situation in order to evaluate the accuracy of industrial sensors and to compare with
measurements.
Originality/value – The paper develops a lamination stack model compliant with interlamination
default analysis. As far as the authors know, this is the first study on 3D electromagnetic modeling.
Keywords Electrical machines, Eddy currents, Electromagnetism, Rotational motion
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Large generator magnetic cores are built from laminated steel. These laminations are
varnish-coated to avoid extra Joule losses and local heating. In some situations, due for
example to manufacturing fault or local overheating, the insulation can be damaged
and an electrical contact appears between sheets. Then, an electrical loop constituted
by the electrical contact, the sheets and the building bar of the lamination stack is
created. As the main flux embraces this closed loop, it leads to the creation of a current,
which can be significant.
Such a situation may be very hazardous for the machine integrity (Tavner and
Anderson, 2005). Practical devices, such as the ELectromagnetic Core Imperfection
Detector (EL CID) technique (Sutton, 1994), are requested for monitoring stator core
 condition in order to detect as soon as possible the defect occurrence. Moreover, an Modelling of
electromagnetic computational tool can be very useful to diagnose a stator core and to short circuited
investigate the consequences of lamination defects. Therefore, in this work we use a 3D
finite element method model with a potential formulation. As the insulation thickness coreplates
is negligible in regard to a sheet thickness, one has to consider a technique to avoid
modelling it. In fact, it will lead to the generation of a mesh with a large number of
elements. Such technique requires some theoretical and numerical developments as the 763
modelling of steel sheets without the insulation gives rise to connexity problems
(Henneron et al., 2006). A solution is proposed in this work to model a stator core with
electrical defects. The physical frontier between each sheet is taken into account by
means of conditions on the fields (Dular and Geuzaine, 2003).
First, we present the EL CID technique and the studied system based on a simplified
structure of the stator core. Secondly, the numerical model using the T-V potential
formulation is developed. Finally, we study the influence of the number of electrical
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fault and of the mesh size on the global quantities, such as the Joule losses.

2. Studied system
2.1 Principle of the EL CID test
The EL CID test (Sutton, 1994) is a widely used testing technique for the inter-laminar
electrical fault detection. From a practical aspect, the rotor is removed and an excitation
winding is placed through the bore. This winding is used to excite the stator core to a low
level, about 4 per cent of the operating flux. Then, the fault current due to a damaged
area is detected by sensing the magnetic field resulting from it. To detect this magnetic
field, a Chattock (1887) potentiometer is placed across the teeth of the core.
The Chattock magnetic potentiometer consists of a coil which measures the
magnetic potential difference between its ends. It is placed across the teeth, as shown in
Figure 1, and is scanned along the slot. When there is no electrical fault in the core, one
can measure a magnetic potential difference in phase with the excitation current. This
component is normally constant around the core. When an electrical fault is present,
the Chattock potentiometer also measures the magnetic field due to the current flowing
through the fault, such as shown in Figure 1, on the tooth tip. As the fault circuit is
mainly resistive, the current is substantially in-phase with the fault voltage and
therefore in phase-quadrature with the excitation current. A phase sensitive detector is
used to discriminate this quadrature component of the fault current from the magnetic
potential difference due to the excitation.

Electrical fault

Figure 1.
EL CID test with a fault
e
located on a tooth tip
Chattock potentiometer
 COMPEL It has been observed that this technique is quite accurate when the electrical faults are
28,3 located in some regions such as the teeth or near a slot. When the fault is situated far
from these regions, the detection signature is less reliable. Then, a numerical model can
be very useful to study and analyse such cases.

2.2 Simplified description

764 In order to validate the numerical model, a simplified structure is studied. The model is
restricted to the smallest part of the stator core where the defect may have an impact
(Figure 2). The simplest core failure is represented. Only one contact is created between
laminations. Moreover, we consider a single building bar. To create the excitation flux,
such as in the EL CID test, the lamination stack of the stator is magnetised with an
inductor on both sides of the iron core (Figure 2). The inductor shape is chosen in order
to obtain a symmetry between the core axial cutting surface. In such system, the
windings of the stator are not considered. The magnetic flux is imposed to obtain the
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nominal operating stator flux.

In this configuration the laminations, the defect and the building bar create a closed
circuit crossed by the inductor flux. Then, eddy currents appear in the laminations,
along the closed loop.
To compute these eddy currents we use the potential formulation T-V. The
insulation is modelled by introducing a specific boundary condition in the T-V
formulation. In the following, we present the formulation and the method to take into
account the physical frontier between each sheet.

3. Numerical model
3.1 Magnetodynamic problem
The modelled system is composed by a set of steel sheets characterised by a magnetic
permeability and by an electric conductivity. The set of the steel sheets and the
building bar constitute the conducting domain. This one is denoted Dc and its
boundary Gc. All steel sheets are electrically insulated. The inductor constitutes the
field source and its current density is supposed to be known. The whole system is
enclosed in an air box. The studied domain is denoted D and its boundary G. The
conducting domain Dc belongs to the domain D (Figure 3).
Then, the defined magnetodynamic problem can be described by the Maxwell’s
equations and the behaviour laws:

Defect Building bar

Laminations

Figure 2.
Modelled system
Inductor
 curl E ¼ 2jvB ðaÞ curl H ¼ J ind þ J s ðbÞ ð1Þ Modelling of
short circuited
div B ¼ 0 ðaÞ divðJ ind þ J s Þ ¼ 0 ðbÞ ð2Þ coreplates
B ¼ m0 mr H ðaÞ J ind ¼ sE ðbÞ ð3Þ
with v, the pulsation; m0, the magnetic permeability of the vacuum; mr, the relative 765
permeability of the material; s, the electrical conductivity; B, the magnetic flux
density; H, the magnetic field; E, the electric field, Js, the known current density flowing
through the inductor and Jind, the eddy current density in the conducting domain.
To ensure the unicity of the solution, boundaries conditions must be added such as:
B · n ¼ 0 on GB and H £ n ¼ 0 on GH ð4Þ
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J ind · n ¼ 0 on GJ and E £ n ¼ 0 on GE ð5Þ

with n the outward unit normal vector, GB < GH ¼ G and GE < GJ ¼ Gc .

3.2 Model of the steel sheets

The considered steel sheet is 0.4 mm thick and its insulation layer thickness is about
5 mm. This dimension is very small in regard to the global dimension of the system. In
these conditions, it would be not realistic, from a practical point of view, to generate a
mesh by taking into account the real geometry. To avoid this problem, the insulating
volume between each steel sheet is taken into account by numerical means. On the
common surface between two steel sheets, a condition on the eddy current density of
type J ind · n ¼ 0 must be imposed. The common surface is then equivalent to an
insulating layer (Figure 4).
In the case of an electric fault between several sheets, the domain Dc is not simply
connected (Henneron et al., 2008). Eddy currents flow through the electrical loop
defined by the short-circuited sheets and the building bar. The numerical model must
be able to take into account these short circuit currents. To illustrate this case, Figure 5
shows the current loop due to an electrical fault between two steel sheets.

3.3 Formulation
To solve the previous problem, the T-V formulation can be used. Two potentials are
introduced: a magnetic scalar potential, denoted V, defined in the whole domain D and
T an electric vector potential defined in the conducting domain Dc. To take into

D
ΓB
ΓH
ΓJind

ΓE
µ, σ

JS
Dc Figure 3.
µ0 Magnetodynamic problem
 COMPEL Steel sheets
28,3
Building bar

766

Figure 4.
Schematic of the steel
Insulating
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sheets model
surfaces

Current
loop

Electrical
Figure 5. fault
Closed loop when an
electrical fault exists Insulating
surface

account electrical faults, a set of fields, support of current loops, must be defined. We
denote by Kc the vector field supporting the current loop ic. Solving the not simply
connected problem in the conducting domain, lead to the definition of a number of
support fields equal to the number of short circuits. Then, the magnetic field can be
written such that:
X
Nd
H ¼ T þ Hs þ K c i c 2 grad V ð6Þ
c¼1

with V ¼ 0 on GH ; T £ n ¼ 0 on GJ and K c £ n ¼ 0 on GH ð7Þ

with Nd the number of electrical faults and Hs the source field deduced from the known
current density in the inductor. The relation between Js and Hs is:
curl H s ¼ J s with H s £ n ¼ 0 on GH ð8Þ
 The eddy current density in Dc can be expressed from two terms: Modelling of
X
Nd short circuited
J ind ¼ Ncic þ JT ð9Þ coreplates
c¼1

with curl T ¼ J T and curl K c ¼ N c ð10Þ 767

with Nc the unit current density defining the current ic and JT the current density
associated with the electric vector potential. The field Nc is free divergence in Dc.
Without an insulating fault, the first term of equation (9) vanishes. To simulate the
insulation surfaces between the sheets, we impose the condition of type J T · n ¼ 0 on
all common surfaces. This condition is easily fixed with the vector potential such that
T £ n ¼ 0.
In the conducting domain, the system to solve is composed of the weak formulation
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of the relations (1a) and (2b) such as:

Z Z
E · curl T t dDc þ jvB · T t dD ¼ 0 ð11Þ
Dc D
Z
B · grad Vt dD ¼ 0 ð12Þ
D

where Tt and Vt are test functions having the same boundary conditions as,
respectively, the potentials T and V. In the domain D\Dc, the magnetic fields are
obtained by solving a classical magnetostatic problem. In this case, only the relation
(12) is considered.
As the set of short circuit currents are unknowns of the problem, Nd relations must
be added to equations (11) and (12) (Henneron et al., 2006):
Z Z
E · curl K c dDc þ jvB · K c dD ¼ 0 with c ¼ {1; . . . ; Nd} ð13Þ
Dc D

Finally, the system of equations is composed of equations (11)-(13). Using the finite
element method, the potentials T and V are discretized in the edge element space and
in the nodal element space, respectively. The set of fields N and K are also discretized
in the edge element space and in the facet element space, respectively. To calculate the
fields N and K, a tree technique can be used (Le Menach et al., 2000).

4. Results
The modelled system shown in Figure 2 has been solved using the potential
formulation described in the previous section. The study is achieved by analyzing the
influence of the number of short-circuited steel sheets and the diameter of the electrical
fault. This one is considered with a circular cross section in the lamination plane. The
influence of the mesh on the global quantities is also studied.
The distribution of the field Kc, introduced in equation (13) and associated with a
fault between two steel sheets, is shown in Figure 6.
 COMPEL In Figure 7, the distribution of the magnetic flux density on the surface of one sheet
28,3 is given. This field is produced by the main inductor described in Section 2.2. Without
electrical fault, we can observe that the maximal value of the magnetic flux density is
located around the inner radius of the core.
In Figure 8, we consider an electric fault, between two steel sheets, located on a tooth
of the stator core. The distribution of the magnetic flux density near a core fault is
768 presented. We can see that the electric fault influences the magnetic field distribution.
In fact, its direction and its magnitude are greatly modified in the vicinity of the fault.
In Figure 9, the distribution of the eddy current density flowing through the insulating
fault is given (cross-section in a plane perpendicular to the lamination). The maximal
value of the current density is observed at the boundary of the fault.
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Figure 6.
Kc vector field for one
default between two
sheets

Figure 7.
Magnetic flux density
distribution in the sheet
plane without default

Figure 8.
Magnetic field near
a core failure
 In the steel sheets domain, the losses Pj are computed by the following relation: Modelling of
Z 2 short circuited
Jind
Pj ¼ dDc ð14Þ coreplates
s
Dc

with the eddy current density defined by equation (9) and s the conductivity associated
with the steel sheets. The losses density is computed by the ratio Pj over the mass of
769
the sheets. In Figure 10, we present the evolution of the eddy current losses density
versus the diameter of the fault and the number of short-circuited steel sheets.
The diameter is obtained from the bulk cylindrical contact between several steel sheets.
The results show that for few short-circuited steel sheets, the eddy current losses do
not vary significantly versus the fault size. If the number of the short-circuited sheets is
important, i.e. larger than 5, the losses increase more rapidly when the diameter of the
fault increases. In this case, the local energy dissipation will lead to a local overheating
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that will damage more seriously the iron core. One must note that, experimentally, we
consider that an electrical fault becomes critical when the number of short-circuited
laminations reaches an amount of 6 or 7.
In Figure 11, the influence of the steel sheets mesh on the Joules losses is presented.
The computed values represent the whole losses in the laminated core and not only in

Figure 9.
Eddy current density near
a core failure

4
3.5
Joules losses (W/kg)

3
2.5
2
2
1.5 3
1 4
5
0.5 Figure 10.
Impact on Joule losses of
0 the defect diameter and
10 20 30 40 50 60 70
the number of defects
Diameter of the fault (mm)
 COMPEL 0.9

28,3 0.85

Joules losses (W/kg)

0.8
with fault
0.75 without fault
0.7
770
0.65
0.6
0.55
Figure 11.
0.5
Influence of the mesh on 1 2 3 4 5 6
the Joules losses
Number of element layers in the sheets
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the fault region. A real influence of the number of element layers used to discretize the
thickness of a lamination can be observed on the global quantities with or without an
electrical fault. In fact, the number of elements must be important to represent the real
distribution of the eddy current density on the sheet and inside the insulating faults.

5. Conclusion
The work presented in this paper is a first approach to the modelling of electrical fault
that may occur in large generator magnetic cores. An experimental technique, the EL
CID test, allows detecting such defects with a quite good accuracy in most cases. In
particular, cases, when the EL CID test is no more reliable, a numerical model can be
very useful to analyze and study such defects.
Then, a numerical magnetodynamic model, including a technique for taking into
account the insulating layers between the laminations, has been developed. To validate
this numerical model, we have studied a classical defect located on a tooth of the stator
core. From the qualitative point of view, results show good agreement with the
experience, i.e. the electrical fault becomes critical when more than five laminations are
short circuited. Moreover, the mesh quality has an influence on the global quantities.
One must take care of the meshing. In a further study, the electromagnetic model will
be linked to a thermal one to analyse local hot spots. With this improvement a
comparison with measurements will be affordable.

References
Chattock, A.P. (1887), “On a magnetic potentiometer”, Philosophical Magazine, Vol. 24 No. 5,
pp. 94-6.
Dular, P. and Geuzaine, C. (2003), “Modeling of thin insulating layers with dual 3-D
magnetodynamic formulations”, IEEE Transactions on Magnetics, Vol. 39 No. 3,
pp. 1139-42.
Henneron, T., Clénet, S. and Piriou, F. (2008), “Insulating layers in electrokinetics problem solved
by the FEM”, Proceedings of ACOMEN 2008, Liege, Belgium, May 26-28.
Henneron, T., Le Menach, Y., Piriou, F., Moreau, O., Clénet, S., Ducreux, J.-P. and Vérité, J.-C.
(2006), “Source field computation in NDT applications”, IEEE Transactions on Magnetics,
Vol. 42 No. 2, pp. 767-70.
 Le Menach, Y., Clénet, S. and Piriou, F. (2000), “Numerical model to discretize source fields in the Modelling of
3D finite element method”, IEEE Transactions on Magnetics, Vol. 36 No. 4, pp. 676-9.
Sutton, J. (1994), “Theory of electromagnetic testing of laminated stator cores”, IEE Insight,
short circuited
Vol. 36 No. 4, pp. 246-51. coreplates
Tavner, P.J. and Anderson, A.F. (2005), “Core faults in large generators”, Proceedings of IEE
Electric Power Applications, Vol. 152 No. 6, pp. 1427-39.
771
About the authors

Jean-Yves Roger graduated in 2003 and received an electrical engineering degree

from Compiegne’s University of Technology (France). He joined EDF R&D in
1995, where he started working on large transformer. Since 2004, he is a Research
Engineer in the Power Systems Technology and Economics Department in
Clamart (France). His research interest is on turbo generators both for thermal
and nuclear power plants. Jean-Yves Roger is the corresponding author and can
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be contacted at: jean-yves.roger@edf.fr

Emmanuel Vrignaud studied in the French Engineering School Central Paris and
is currently studying electrical engineering in the University of Chile in Santiago
of Chile with a convenient double degree between the two universities. He did a
professional training, in EDF R&D, consisting in modeling short circuits between
coreplates in large generators for six months in 2007.

Thomas Henneron graduated in electrical engineering in 2001 and received the

degree of doctor in electrical engineering in 2004, both from the University of
Lille 1, France. He joined the L2EP, University of Lille 1, in 2001 as a PhD student.
From 2004 until 2006, he has been a postdoctoral researcher at the L2EP. Since
2006, he is an Associate Professor at the L2EP. His research interests mainly
concern the introduction of global electric and magnetic quantities in the potential
formulations in the case of electromagnetic systems.

Abdelkader Benabou graduated in material science in 1999 and received the

degree of doctor in electrical engineering in 2002, both from the University of
Lille 1, France. He joined the L2EP, University of Lille 1, in 1999 as a PhD student.
From 2002 until 2004, he has been a postdoctoral researcher at the L2EP. Since
2004, he is an Associate Professor at the L2EP. His research interests mainly
concern modelling and characterisation of magnetic materials, especially in the
context of electromagnetic systems modelling.

Jean-Pierre Ducreux received the Ecole Centrale de Lille degree in 1989, and his
PhD degree from the University of Lille in 1994. Since 1993 he has been a
Research Engineer for the French Utility Electricite de France. His research
interests include computational electromagnetics, electrical machine modelling
ang magnetical properties.

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