The Faraday electrical machines laboratory

Abstract

The author had the major responsibility for developing a new concept for an electrical laboratory with the aid of industrial grants at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. A description of the laboratory designed to meet specific objectives is covered in the referenced literature. Emphasis is placed on the teaching of the physical understanding of the internal behavior of transformers and rotating machines. Information windings designed into the small machines, accompanied by analog computing elements, provide the basis for the shape measurement philosophy of the laboratory. Details of many unique experiments with typical recorded results dealing with transformers, induction and synchronous machines, and some system phenomena are included. For example, the two components of the total excitation current of a transformer are isolated and recorded individually under steady-state and transient conditions for any line voltage and load. The rotating field is extensively explored and other experiments relate to the slip between the rotatiag field and the rotor of an induction motor. The sudden loading of synchronous machines reveals the transient behavior of internal power, instantaneous speed, and rotor position. The most complex experiment involves ferroresonance in a system consisting of a synchronous generator and a capacitance compensated transmission line terminated in a three-phase transformer bank.