Experimental study of the breakdown characteristic of glycerol as energy storage medium in pulse forming line

In this paper, the breakdown characteristic of glycerol acted by high voltage pulse with positive and negative polarity under different pressures and temperatures was researched experimentally. A coaxial voltage withstanding device for high voltage breakdown test was well designed and manufactured. The polarity test results of glycerol show that, at the temperature of 25 °C, the averaged positive and negative polarity breakdown field strength was found to be 246 kV/cm and 256 kV/cm respectively, which indicates that glycerol has no polarity. In addition, compared with the situation of standard atmospheric pressure, the breakdown field strength at 7 atms was increased by approximately 24.4%. Furthermore, breakdown test at different temperatures show that the average breakdown field strength of glycerol reduces gradually from 320 kV/cm for minus 45 °C to 200 kV/cm for 55 °C, and it can also be found that the breakdown field strength is gradually reduced with the increasing of liquid temperature, and the trend tends to be smooth.