First-order perturbation approach to elliptic winding deformations

We apply a novel on-line method to detect elliptic deformations of winding turns in a power transformer. We employ the first-order perturbation theory to a transformer winding surrounded by the transformer tank wall and the magnetic core. The transformer winding is modeled as a structure consisting of thin conducting cylindrical rings (winding segments or turns) situated within a coaxial cylindrical waveguide, where the inner conducting cylinder represents the magnetic core and the outer conducting cylinder represents the wall of the transformer tank. We simulate antennas inside the transformer tank to radiate and measure microwave fields, in order to identify and quantify elliptic deformations of the individual winding segments or individual turns. The propagation problem is solved by conventional waveguide theory, including mode-matching and cascading techniques. We utilize optimization to solve the inverse problem and obtain a good agreement between the reconstructed and true deformations of the winding segments.