New observations of conduction current bursts in highly-stressed insulating liquids

Abstract

Observations were made of the temporal variations of conduction currents through point-to-sphere and sphere-to-sphere gaps of insulating oil and of n-hexane under high direct voltages. Current bursts were distinguished from the normal fluctuations of the quasi-steady current component. Long-duration bursts were similar to some previous observations, but many short bursts had the polarity opposite to that of the quasi-steady component.