Abstract
This study presents a new technique for detecting rotor electrical faults in wind turbine doubly-fed induction generators (DFIGs), controlled by a stator field-oriented vector control scheme. This is a novel method aimed at detecting and identifying rotor electrical asymmetry faults from within the rotor-side inverter control loop, using the error signal, to provide a future method of generator condition monitoring with enhanced detection sensitivity. Simulation and experimental measurements of the proposed signals were carried out under steady-state operation for both healthy and faulty generator conditions. Stator current and power were also investigated for rotor electrical asymmetry detection and comparison made with rotor-side inverter control signals. An investigation was then performed to define the sensitivity of the proposed monitoring signals to fault severity changes and a comparison made with previous current, power and vibration signal methods. The results confirm that a simple spectrum analysis of the proposed control loop signals gives effective and sensitive DFIG rotor electrical asymmetry detection.
Highlights
Over the last 15 years, variable speed wind turbines (WTs) with doubly-fed induction generators (DFIGs) have become the most applied WT technology and the drive train choice for up to 60% of large, >1.5 MW WTs [1]
The work described in this paper extends previous WT-IG failure diagnosis research in [8], based on stator current and total power spectra, to consider WT-DFIG fault detection using generator control loop signals
Similar to a real WT-DFIG, the rotor is associated with a back-to-back converter and the stator directly connected to the grid in the closed-loop Test Rig configuration
Summary
Over the last 15 years, variable speed wind turbines (WTs) with doubly-fed induction generators (DFIGs) have become the most applied WT technology and the drive train choice for up to 60% of large, >1.5 MW WTs [1]. Based on simulation and experimental investigation, frequency analyses of control current signals have been presented in [11] to diagnose the stator and rotor faults of controlled squirrel cage induction motors (SCIMs). The work described in this paper extends previous WT-IG failure diagnosis research in [8], based on stator current and total power spectra, to consider WT-DFIG fault detection using generator control loop signals. It concentrates on the rotor side inverter (RSI) and compares the effectiveness of control loop fault detection signals with stator current, total power and vibration signals. These comparisons will demonstrate that the proposed method can reliably detect rotor fault, regardless of fault severity
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