Porcelain long rod insulators are largely used for Overhead transmission lines (OHTL) power transmission. These insulators can widely cater to a broad range of strength classes, close to 550kN as-mechanical tensile loads. The advancements in engineering and associated production methodologies have also resulted in improved designs of complete insulator string configurations that include integrated hardware accessories. The recent growth in the need for electric power has strongly emphasized the need for high-voltage transmission lines that demand porcelain long rod insulators with di-electrics integrity and increased mechanical strength requirements.

This study reviews and summarises the experimental tests for determining pollution performance on different design variants of porcelain long rod insulators at high-voltage test laboratories under in-service environmental conditions. The authors investigate the operational performance of two variants (generation I for the old design & generation II for the new design) of porcelain long rod insulators that differ in physical dimensions from actual designs.

The paper focuses on the pollution performance of porcelain long rod insulators, especially in artificially polluted conditions. The summarised test results infer that pollution withstand and flashover voltage values of the generation II design are higher than the generation I design of porcelain long rod insulators.

Learn more in this study presented by Amith Gururaj Karanth, Application Engineer of the Insulation Technology Group, at the INMR 2023 Conference in Bangkok.