Detection of volatile impurities in turbine oils by the heat-pulse testing method

Abstract

The research is aimed at development and implementation of methods and devices to control critical sections of the oil system of the power equipment that operates in the real time mode. The task was to develop a method for rapid detection of volatile impurities in turbine oils. The approach to the study is based on quantitative assessment of the short-term thermal stability of the substance that is formally associated with the content of the volatile impurity. The approach was selected on the basis of the results of search experiments taking into consideration the formulation of requirements for the method and the device, viz., (1) the method should reliably determine the moisture content in the range of 10–150 g of the impurity per ton of oil and (2) the device is to be applicable “in situ.” For this purpose, a variant of the method of the controlled pulse heating of a wire probe, a resistance thermometer, has been developed. The advantages of the method are its speed, sensitivity to small contents of volatile impurities regardless of the nature of the impurity, and smallness of methodologically contributed perturbation. The heating conditions of the probe most sensitive to the appearance of moisture— including its trace amounts—in the system, has been defined. The duration of the measurement is on the order of milliseconds; the heat flux density through the surface of the probe reaches 1 MW/m2. The essence of the method consists in measuring, in the characteristic time interval, the temperature of the thermal instability onset associated with the content of the volatile impurity. The approach proposed by the authors is aimed at increasing the lifetime of the oil and preventing unpredictable failures of the operating equipment.