Modeling and Experimental Investigation of Stator Winding Faults in Induction Motors

Abstract

Induction motors play a vital role in industrial applications. Early detection of abnormalities in the motor would help to avoid costly breakdowns. Realizing a versatile modeling of motor winding faults is essential for developing and evaluating protection functions. Accordingly, this article presents an accurate mathematical model for stator winding faults in induction motors for both transient and steady-state analysis. This model is based on the d-q-axis theory and is valid for phase-to-ground, phase-to-phase, and turn-to-turn faults. These turn-to-turn shorts arise as one of the most prevalent and potentially destructive electrical faults in induction motors. For investigating the performance of the proposed modeling, an experimental setup is structured with a 0.5-HP, 2-pole, 380/220-V squirrel-cage induction motor. The motor stator winding was rewound for enabling a turn-to-turn fault application. The digital signal processing board (DS1003) is employed for data acquisition and recording purposes. A reasonably close agreement between the measured and simulated results has been observed, which supports the validity of the proposed analysis.