Detection of Carbon Particle Pollutants in Transformer Oil Based on the Microfluidic Imager

The carbon particles in the insulating oil are the main factors leading to the degradation of the insulating oil performance, and the timely detection of the carbon content in transformer oil is meaningful for the analysis of potential faults in transformers. In this paper, six groups of oil samples with different pollution levels were prepared by adding carbon particles with different mass and particle size into transformer oil. The oil samples were detected by microfluidic imager, and the microfluidic images of carbon particles in the oil samples as well as the particle size/concentration distribution figures were obtained. The calculated concentration of the contaminated oil sample was obtained based on the particle size/concentration distribution figures, and the detection results of the contaminated oil sample were compared and analyzed. The experimental result shows that the calculated concentration of the contaminated oil sample is close to the actual concentration, the satisfactory prediction results has been achieved. The particle image, particle size distribution, particle concentration and other information of carbon particles in insulating oil with different particle size ranges can be obtained by the microfluidic imager. It provides a reference for the detection of the carbon particle contamination in transformer oil.