J.

Vogel (Westinghouse Electric and

Manufacturing Company, Sharon, Pa.):
In the report on transformer protection,
there is one subject which is of importance
which is not completely worked out, and
which I believe should be more completely
determined later.
This subject is, whether increased voltage
strength of transformers at extremely short
times is necessary, depending on service
conditions, if it can be obtained, and if so
what values can be obtained reasonably.
This includes giving an idea as to gap lengths
which might be expected to furnish some
degree of protection, where gaps alone may
be used.
In the case of extremely steep and heavy
discharge currents, the lightning arrester
discharge voltages may be greater than
shown in the report, which limits the data
to currents of 20,000 amperes, and to a
given wave shape. In turn, this indicates
that higher strengths of transformer insulation for extremely short wave fronts may be
desirable. Further, if gaps alone are used
for protection, this characteristic may be
very desirable. That it can possibly be obtained is indicated in figure 3 of the report.
In order to obtain an idea of what might be
reasonably done, I would like to make an
example of the 115-kv voltage class, having
a 3-microsecond strength of 625 kv. If the
upper curve of figure 3 were used, a strength
of approximately 145 per cent of that at 3
microseconds would give over 900 kv, which
would also be equivalent to testing with a
25-inch gap, from curve figure 15, at 1,000
kv per microsecond. If the lower curve
figure 3 is used, the voltage value would be
800 kv and the gap length 20 inches. If no
additional margin were required, a 20-inch
or 25-inch gap might be expected to provide
reasonable protection for steep waves, provided it were immediately at the terminals.
Also, at 3 microseconds a 25-inch gap would
flash at 560 kv, compared to the 625-kv
transformer strength, and at about 490 kv
for long waves against a transformer strength
of 540 kv.
This discussion is not given for the purpose of advocating any definite procedure,
but to show how such station gap lengths
might be obtained. Probably many operators would feel that these gaps are too small
for operation. A further caution should be
given, and that is, that this increase in transformer insulation voltage strength at short
times is not necessarily obtained, except
with great care in design and construction,
and if it is to be counted on, a test would be
required. This has been under consideration in the transformer subcommittee.
F.

burgh, Pa.): The paper by C. Concordia

and G. K. Carter represents an important
contribution to the problem of negative
damping. It solves the most complicated
case in which primary resistance as well as
series capacitance and steady-state power
limit have influence and gives a new criterion
on hunting due to the primary resistance.
The authors have found that the hunting
criterion r ~ x q tan ~, of reference 1 of the
paper, is too optimistic for small generator
angles and too pessimistic for larger angles.
This checks with calculations made by myself. I have found that the values of the
negative damping as given by reference 1
are too low for small positive angles 0 as
well as for any negative angle s. The new
hunting criterion r ~Xd' tan 0 as proposed
by the authors has to be checked for at least
one more value of To.

C. N. Weygandt (Moore School of Electrical

Engineering, University of Pennsylvania,
Philadelphia, Pa.): I wish to congratulate
the authors on their complete and rigorous
solution of the problem of negative damping. Also, and I speak from experience, I
can well appreciate the labor that was involved in testing the roots of the determinant in equation 4.
The only thing that the paper lacks is
some experimental checks of the new points
of interest disclosed by the theory. Since
we have at the Moore School a machine of
the type studied by the authors I have made
a few tests of the case when the machine is
connected to an infinite bus through resistances. Figure 1 of this discussion shows the
results of these tests. By comparison with
figure 1 of the paper, it can be seen that
qualitatively the tests check the theory excellently. There is no question about the
fact that the curve for higher excitation
crosses that for lower excitation as predicted.
Also the test curves bear the same relation
to the old criterion r = x q tan 0 as the theoretical curves of figure 1. It will be interesting to see whether the quantitative check
is as good, as soon as time is available to draw

-,

2.0

! xd='O

,
,
,,
,,

: E=1

,,

Xd': 0 .236
To: 52

U : 2060

C. Concordia and G. K. Carter: We are

very pleased to find that qualitative checks
of part of our analysis have been made by
both discussers. The test data presented
by Mr. Weygandt are especially interesting
and are a remarkable confirmation of the
rather peculiar contour of the stable region
which our calculations showed. Mr. Liwschitz has also found that damping torque
calculations made on the basis of the formulas of reference 1 of the paper deviate from
his more accurate results. However, as he
has shown in his paper;' the more commonly
used methods of equation 64 of reference 8
of the paper or equation 2 of reference 2 of
this closure show no such discrepancies.
We agree with Mr. Liwschitz that the hunting criterion should be checked at other
values of To, and shall do so a,s soon as time
permits.
REFERENCES

1.

POSITIVE

CHRONOUS

AND

pages 210-13.

2.

Two

DAMPJNC

M. M. Liwschitz.

volume 68,

REACTION

MACHINES-II,
TIONS,

NEGATIVE

MACHINES,

TRANSACTIONS,

IN

SYN-

AlEE

1941 (May section),

THEORY

R. H. Park.

OF

SYNCHRONOUS

AI EE

volume 52, 1933, page 3;')2.

TRANSAC-

Analysis of ShortCircuit Oscillograms

Discussion and author's closure of paper 41-2,
by W. W. Kuyper, presented at the AlEE
winter convention, Philadelphia, Pa., January 27-31, 1941, and published in AlEE
TRANSACTIONS, 1941 (April section)
pages 151-3.

Figure 1. Experimental curves of stability

limits, 31.3-kw machine without amortisseur
connected to infinite bus

c. F. Wagner (Westinghouse Electric and

Manufacturing Company, East Pittsburgh,
Pa.): Mr. Kuyper has raised a very interesting point in interpreting the oscillograrns
obtained on three-phase short circuits of
unsymmetrical machines. In order to
form an idea of magnitudes of errors that
might result in basing the measured reactance upon the distance between the envelope of the al terna ting component of
short-circuit current, I have made some
calculations for short circuits from no
load in which the decrements were neglected,
that is, instead of projecting the alternating
component of current to zero and thus
determine the component before it has decreased, it was assumed that there was no
decrement. In addition, the assumed en-

Discussions

AlEE

Negative Damping of
Electrical Machinery

M. M. Liwschitz (Westinghouse Electric

and Manufacturing Company, East Pitts-

Xq=0.423

I
I

E:f.3~

Discussion and authors' closure of paper 41-12

by C. Concordia and G. K. Carter, presented
at the AlEE winter convention, Philadelphia,
Pa., January 27-31, 1941, and published in
AlEE TRANSACTIONS, 1941 (March section) pages 116-19.

I
I

900

theoretical curves for the actual machine

tested.
During the test it was observed that the
hunting at low values of resistance was much
more violent than for high values of resistance, and also that period was shorter. The
violent hunting was of course accompanied
by rapid swings of armature current, which
in turn induced currents in the field circuit.
This could easily be observed from the pulsating of the needle of the field ammeter.
It seems logical since there 111USt have been
an a-c component in the field circuit that
Xd' tan 0 would be a better criterion than
x q tan s.

o. 4

It~
'>(

UNSTA ~LE

STABLE
r=X q ta 6

~p'

20

40
60
80
ROTOR ANGLE ~ 6

100

120

TRANSACTIONS