Giant magneto resistive sensing of critical power system parameters

Several experimental and computational attempts to sense and measure the most critical electromechanical operating parameters of power system are conducted in the laboratory. In this paper, power system parameters such as load current (I), partial discharge (PD), corona discharge (CD), capacitive charging current (CCC), and applied high voltage (HV) are under investigation. The objective is to optimize the utilization of some newly developed, low cost, and commercially available hardware sensors and equipment. The hardware includes some novel elements such as, giant magneto resistive (GMR) current/magnetic field sensors. All components are contained around power conductors in a specially designed, none-magneto equipotential cylindrical structure (NECS) prototype. Objectives are being met to manipulate GMR to sense I and HV. From the experimental results and feasibility calculations, GMR sensors are found to maintain their known wide linearity range and accuracy. The manipulations to measure I include: distance, current, bias, and orientation alterations. The manipulations of sensing PD, CD, CCC, and HV include the utilization of a sensitive GMR earth field sensor to measure the short circuited CCC through the NECS prototype.