Characterization of symmetrical electrode system to estimate the degree of uniformity under symmetrically and asymmetrically applied high voltage

The high voltage withstanding capacity of a apparatus depends on the degree of uniformity of the electric field developed in the dielectric, which in turn is affected not only by the type of voltage applied also by the physical shape and size of the electrodes used. Different types of electrode systems such as Sphere-sphere, sphere-plane, plane-plane etc. are used in high voltage for the experimental investigation of breakdown mechanism as well as degree of uniformity of different gaseous and liquid insulating materials under high voltage. But it is a time consuming and costly affair to perform a series of experiments taking electrodes of wide variety of shape and size. In this paper, the results of simulation to estimate the distribution of equipotential lines and the intensity of the electric field developed in the inter-electrode gap for two different types of electrodes are presented. During characterization, voltage level and depth of insulating material are considered to be the same and the degree of uniformity has been estimated. From the experimental results and performance analysis, it has been observed that the distribution of equipotential lines are different for different types of electrode systems, even if the voltage level and the insulating materials are the same. The degree of uniformity is also different for different electrode system, even if the other conditions are similar.