Current Impulse Velocity After the Air Gap Breakdown at Atmospheric Pressure

Abstract

The characteristics of the air gap discharge are of interest among researchers on high voltage and lightning study. This letter uses a self-developed high-speed observation system to measure the propagation velocity of the current impulse after the air gap breakdown in the rod-to-plane discharge with dc voltage. In addition, the discharge channel is captured by a still camera. From the time difference of arrival of light signals in different receiving channels of high-speed observation system, it shows that the propagation velocity of the current impulse is in the range from 4.3 ± 0.36 × 106 to 1.1 ± 0.09 × 107 m/s.