Dielectric Constant, Tan Delta & Resistivity of

Ester Oils as Insulating Oils in Transformer

N. S. Suhaimi, Kak Mar, Kak Ema, Kak Kina, Dr. Taufik
Faculty of Electrical & Electronic Engineering
National Defense University of Malaysia
Kuala Lumpur
sabrina15.eec@gmail.com

AbstractThere are several method and

testing can be used in order to show the
characteristics of insulating oils in
transformer.
By
referring
to
the
characteristics, the performance of insulating
oil can be evaluated and compared. One of
the method to observe the characteristics of
insulating oil is based on measurement of
dielectric constant, tan delta and resistivity.
This paper commonly focused on the
comparison behavior of insulator between
four different types of ester oils which is rice
bran oil, palm oil, corn oil, sunflower oil and
canola oil. Each ester oils are categorized into
as received oil and dry oil type. As received
oil is an insulating oil that tested directly
from the supplier without any process, while
dry insulating oil need to be dry for 2 days
with 85C temperature. The purpose of
drying the insulating oil is to remove the
unwanted particles or contaminant that will
affect the efficiency of insulator oil. The oil
sample is tested using ADTR-2K PLUS in
order to measure dielectric constant, tan
delta and resistivity value. In this paper, AC
breakdown voltage test also necessary to test
in order to observe the value of breakdown
voltage which gives great influence on
characteristics of insulating oil.
Keywords-ester oils, tan , resistivity,
dielectric constant, breakdown voltage
I.

INTRODUCTION

Insulating oil or known as transformer

oil helps to dissipate heat of the transformer and
also act as liquid insulation in transformer. It
also preserve the core and winding as they are
fully immersed inside with oil and it prevents
direct contact of atmospheric oxygen with

cellulose paper insulation winding, which is

susceptible to oxidation. The investigation of
electrical properties of ester oil is necessary in
order to determine the efficiency of insulating
oil for transformer application. Although
mineral insulating oil has a good insulation
performance and low cost, but its low flash
point, ignition point, and biodegradability
cannot satisfy the requirement of high fire
performance and environmental protection. Due
to environmental issue, ester oils is considered
as a new option to replace the mineral oil 1.
There is a relationship between
dielectric constant, dissipation factor and
resistivity which is related to the efficiency of
insulator behavior. In this paper, a comparison
of dielectric properties of five different type of
ester oil is been studied. The purpose of this
paper is to identify the ester oil characteristics
and compare the dielectric properties in order to
get better quality of insulating oil. Due to
improper storage, insulating oil tends to absorb
moisture from the air in the process of
transportation and storage2. Moisture content
dissolved in insulating oil and temperature are
closely related.
Thus, it will affect the
characteristics of insulating oil.
II.

DISSIPATION FACTOR, RESISTIVITY &

DIELECTRIC CONSTANT

The three most importance electrical properties

of the insulating oil test are dielectric constant,
tan (loss angle) and resistivity (). Other
important properties are viscosity, thermal
stability, specific gravity, flash point and others 3.
The measurement of dielectric properties
principle is based on the insertion of the oil
sample to the Schering Bridge and its

subsequent balancing which is used for

measurement of insulating properties principle.

and normally indicates a low concentration of

conductive contaminants.

When a sinusoidal voltage is applied

across an insulator, the current through insulator
is ideally leads voltage by 90. However, in
reality, there is no insulating materials that
naturally a perfect dielectric. Tangent of the
angle is the angle that short of 90 or called as
dissipation factor. In the presence of alternating
field, there is created a capacitance current and a
resistive current that are 90 out of phase with
respect to each other. The vector sum of these
two currents represents the total current and the
angle between the capacitance current vector
and the resultant total current vector is classified
as loss angle.

The dielectric constant is a nonsinusoidal parameter that depends on the

internal structure of insulating oil. The dielectric
constant or called as relative permittivity shows
how easily a material can become polarized by
existence of electric field on insulating oil 5. It is
the ratio of the permittivity of an insulating oil
to the permittivity of free space or vacuum.

Tan testing method which is a

diagnostic technique in order to determine the
quality of the insulating oils. When insulating
materials is placed between live and grounded
part of an electrical equipment, leakage current
will flow. It is desirable to have the value of tan
as small as possible. According to IEC
standard Publication 502, 1978, the maximum
value of dissipation factor at ambient
temperature is 0.004 at rated power-frequency
voltage. High value of tan indicate presence of
contaminants in insulating oil. Most insulating
systems, the value of tan is increasing with the
increment in applied voltage or stress voltage4.
Electrical resistance of an electrical
conductor refers to the opposition in the passage
of an electric current that through a conductor.
The resistivity of insulating oil reduces
drastically while temperature increases. When
transformer has been shut off for a long time, its
oil temperature shall be similar with ambient.
However, for full load case, the temperature can
be rise up till 90C especially at overload
condition. It is important to measure resistivity
of insulating oil at 27C as well as 90C. Hence,
covering the minimum and maximum expected
high temperatures. Refers to the standard,
actual minimum standard for specific resistance
of insulating oil at 90C is 35 x 10 -cm
(maximum) and lower boundary at 27C is 1500
x 10 (minimum). High resistivity reflects low
content of free ions and ion-forming particles,

The most important factor which affects

the dielectric strength of the transformer oil is
the presence of fine water droplets and the
fibrous impurities6. The presence of even 0.01%
water in oil brings down the dielectric strength
to 20% of the dry oil value and fibrous
impurities bring down the dielectric strength
much sharply. The moisture content dissolved in
insulating oil and oil temperature will affect the
behavior of dielectric properties. Water in
insulating oil regularly increases with the rising
of solubility with temperature. When the relative
moisture content exceeds the saturated moisture
content of the oil, the insulation properties of the
ester insulating oil are remarkably affected7.
III. EXPERIMENTS
A.

Preparation of Insulating Oils

Ester oil samples is classified by two

categories which is as received and dry
insulating oil. As received insulating oil is
directly tested from the supplier or market. On
other hand, dry insulating oil is tested after dry
process at 85C for 2 days in order to eliminate
any unwanted particles in the insulating oil.
B.

AC Breakdown Voltage Test

Before begin the dissipation factor,

resistivity and dielectric constant measurement,
ester oils is tested using BAUR Oil tester DTA
100C in order to measure the minimum voltage
that the spark could occur between the
electrodes which causes an insulator to become
electrically conductive. The AC breakdown
voltage test have great influence on efficiency of
insulating oils. It refers to the minimum voltage
which results in part of an insulator to become
an electric conductor. Higher value of
breakdown voltage produce better characteristic

of insulating oil. For AC breakdown test, bispherical electrodes were installed horizontally
with 2.5mm gap distance followed by IEC
60156 standard8. The system of AC breakdown
voltage tester operates fully automatically,
which is very convenient for long test series. Oil
sample was put into the test cell which AC
voltage with frequency 50Hz is applied to the
electrode and 50 reading of breakdown voltage
is recorded for each type of oil.
C.

Dielectric Constant, Tan Delta & Resistivity

Test

The ADTR-2K PLUS, an automated instrument

is used in order to measure the electrical
characteristic of insulating oil. It can measure
the capacitance, dielectric constant (), dielectric
losses, tan (dissipation factor), resistance, and
resistivity of the test sample. The instrument is
set at 500V AC and DC voltage supplied while
the temperature is set at 27C until 90C with
increments of 10C which corresponding to the
minimum expected temperature (ambiance
temperature)
and
maximum
expected
temperature(overload
condition)9.
When
insulating oil is excited with AC source, the
ADTR-2K PLUS measures the voltage,
capacitance and tan while DC source measures
the voltage and resistivity value of dielectric. To
determine the dielectric constant (), the
measurements are carried on an empty and full
test cell.
IV. RESULTS & DISCUSSION

Table 1 shows the result of average AC

breakdown voltage between five different types
of insulating oils. It can be observed that the
highest AC breakdown voltage is sunflower oil
after the dry process is done and the lowest
breakdown voltage value is palm oil as received
from the supply. In addition, as compared
between as received oil and dry type of oil, it
can be observed that dry type of oil is higher
than as received oil.

Table 1: Comparison of AC Breakdown Voltage

between Rice Bran oil, Palm Oil, Corn Oil,
Sunflower Oil and Canola Oil.
The result of dielectric constant, tan and
resistivity is usually expressed as a percentage.
Table 3 Table 11 show the reading of electrical
properties at different temperature for five
different types of oil.
Temperature
(C)
26.0
30.0
40.0
50.0
60.0
70.0
80.0
90.0

Capacitance
(pF)
189.3
188.9
186.4
182.9
190.5
190.0
187.4
182.9

Tan
0.00294
0.00569
0.00851
0.26500
0.01039
0.01529
0.02173
0.02926

Resistivity
(G)
4.9150
3.2240
2.4440
1.1100
1.5190
1.0410
0.7484
0.5741

Table 2: Electrical Properties of Rice Bran Oil

(as received)
Temperature
(C)
26.0
30.0
40.0
50.0
60.0
70.0
80.0
90.0

Capacitance
(pF)
191.4
188.7
185.9
183.7
182.1
179.9
177.6
175.5

Tan
0.00488
0.00770
0.01223
0.01799
0.02186
0.03086
0.04310
0.05860

Resistivity
(G)
3.7150
2.4350
1.5460
1.0490
0.8228
0.5869
0.4299
0.3203

Table 3: Electrical Properties of Rice Bran Oil

(dry)
Temperature
(C)
27.0
30.0
40.0
50.0
60.0
70.0
80.0
90.0

Capacitance
(pF)
189.9
187.8
185.2
183.1
182.6
180.2
177.7
175.5

Tan
0.00329
0.00601
0.00978
0.01390
0.01462
0.02013
0.02651
0.03449

Resistivity
(G)
3.9246
2.7286
1.7816
1.2846
1.2106
0.8898
0.6867
0.5335

Table 4: Electrical Properties of Palm Oil (as

received)

Table 5: Electrical Properties of Palm Oil (dry)include the data later

Temperature
(C)
27.0
30.0
40.0
50.0
60.0
70.0
80.0
90.0

Capacitance
(pF)
194.9
193.9
190.8
188.2
187.5
184.9
181.9
178.9

Tan
0.01203
0.02062
0.03598
0.05260
0.05150
0.06590
0.08570
0.10950

Resistivity
(G)
1.0560
0.7939
0.4795
0.3338
0.3302
0.2604
0.2051
0.1641

Table 6: Electrical Properties of Corn Oil (as

received)
Temperature
(C)
27.0
30.0
40.0
50.0
60.0
70.0
80.0
90.0

Capacitance
(pF)
191.0
190.3
187.6
185.3
184.3
181.6
179.2
176.7

Tan
0.00572
0.00931
0.01597
0.02396
0.02591
0.03604
0.04860
0.06360

Resistivity
(G)
2.0070
1.6780
1.0300
0.7077
0.6431
0.4704
0.3573
0.2755

26.0
30.0
40.0
50.0
60.0
70.0
80.0
90.0

198.9
197.5
194.4
191.8
192.5
191.1
187.8
184.3

0.00927
0.00571
0.00352
0.00481
0.00579
0.00860
0.01236
0.01707

1.7390
3.2490
4.6090
3.0510
2.8370
1.9390
1.3930
1.0420

Table 10: Electrical Properties of Canola Oil (as

received)
Table 11: Electrical Properties of Canola Oil
(dry) include the data later

Figure 1 and Figure 2 show the comparison of

dissipation factor between five different types of
oils (as received and dry type). As observed
from the graph, the increasing of temperature
caused increment of dissipation factor. Thus,
temperature is inversely proportional to
dielectric strength. It also can be observed that
from the early stage of temperature to the full
load temperature, canola oil is constantly results
the lowest dissipation factor.

Table 7: Electrical Properties of Corn Oil (dry)

Temperature
(C)
27.0
30.0
40.0
50.0
60.0
70.0
80.0
90.0

Capacitance
(pF)
174.9
174.3
172.0
19.9
169.6
167.5
165.2
162.8

Tan
0.00628
0.00620
0.00866
0.01171
0.01407
0.20000
0.02878
0.04060

Resistivity
(G)
3.0320
3.2430
2.2350
1.6210
1.2960
0.9211
0.6464
0.4658

Table 8: Electrical Properties of Sunflower Oil

(as received)
Temperature
(C)
27.0
30.0
40.0
50.0
60.0
70.0
80.0
90.0

Capacitance
(pF)
197.7
197.1
194.4
192.2
193.3
191.6
188.2
184.9

Tan
0.00159
0.00202
0.00367
0.00567
0.00682
0.00999
0.01413
0.01919

Resistivity
(G)
7.0960
6.7020
4.1220
2.7770
2.2790
1.6080
1.1850
0.8793

Figure 1: Comparison of Dissipation Factor (Tan

) Between Rice Bran Oil, Palm Oil, Corn Oil,
Sunflower Oil and Canola Oil (As Received).

Table 9: Electrical Properties of Sunflower Oil

(dry)
Temperature
(C)

Capacitance
(pF)

Tan

Resistivity
(G)

Figure 2: Comparison of Dissipation Factor (Tan

) Between Rice Bran Oil, Palm Oil, Corn Oil,

Sunflower Oil and Canola Oil (Dry).canola and
palm oil result not yet included
Figure 3 and Figure 4 contained the resistivity
of variation of oils at different temperature. It
can be observed from the as received oil graph
(Figure 3), at ambiance temperature, rice bran
oil contained the highest resistivity while corn
oil contained the lowest resistivity from the
beginning temperature to the last temperature.
For canola oil, it resistivity begin to increase at
26C and gradually decreased at 40C but it has
been observed that canola oil contained the
highest resistivity at full load condition. As for
dry types of oils (Figure 4), sunflower oil
contained the most resistivity compare to others
at different temperature. Thus, sunflower can be
categorized as good insulating oil compare to
other insulating oils.

As for figure 5 and figure 6, the value of

dielectric constant can be calculated by using
the ratio of capacitance value at test cell that
contained insulating oil to the capacitance value
at empty test cell. Before the measurement of
insulating oil, the value of capacitance at empty
cell is 64.7pF. For as received type of oils,
canola have the highest value of dielectric
constant. On other hand, for dry type sunflower
contained the highest dielectric constant among
ester oils.

Figure 5: Comparison of Dielectric Constant

between Rice Bran Oil, Palm Oil, Corn Oil,
Sunflower Oil and Canola Oil (As
Received).recheck dielectric constant value for
sunflower at 50degree

Figure 3: Comparison of Resistivity between

Rice Bran Oil, Palm Oil, Corn Oil, Sunflower
Oil and Canola Oil (As Received).

Figure 4: Comparison of Resistivity between

Rice Bran Oil, Palm Oil, Corn Oil, Sunflower
Oil and Canola Oil (Dry). Canola and palm oil
result not yet included

Figure 6: Comparison of Dielectric Constant

between Rice Bran Oil, Palm Oil, Corn Oil,
Sunflower Oil and Canola Oil (Dry).palm oil
and canola result not yet included.

CONCLUSION

The present work focuses on the comparative

study on electrical properties of insulating oil
such as dielectric constant, dissipation factor,
and resistivity between five different of ester
oils. The electrical properties of insulating oils
are related to the inability of molecules in the
insulating oil to reorient themselves with an
alternating electric field. The measurement of
dielectric constant, tan & resistivity are
electrical characteristics of the insulating oil that
used to monitor the quality of the oil regarding
to deterioration and presence of contaminant.
From the experiment, we can conclude that
canola oil have the lowest dissipation factor,
highest resistivity and highest dielectric constant
among the ester oils. The temperature of oil is
directly proportional to dissipation factor and

inversely proportional to the dielectric strength.

The lowest dissipation factor show the best
performance of insulator characteristics.
Furthermore, high resistivity and dielectric
constant gives high dielectric strength for
insulating oil.
V.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

We would like to thank our supervisor, Dr.

Mohd Taufik bin Ishak for his guidance in this
project. Productive discussions and comments
received from him have shown us the right way.
We also would like to thank Faculty of
Electrical and Electronic Engineering which
provide us the equipment for this project. Last
but not least we would like to give our special
thanks to beloved parents for their great support
during our educational career.

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