Fabrication and simulation of permittivity graded materials for electric field grading of gas insulated power apparatus

An innovation for the higher performance and reliability of electric power apparatus can be brought about by a novel technique on electrical insulating materials. The application of functionally graded materials (FGM) with spatial distribution of dielectric permittivity in solid insulator is an effective technique to contribute to the above innovation, because FGM can control the electric field distribution with a simple shape. In this paper, we investigated the fabrication and simulation techniques of FGM with various spatial distributions of dielectric permittivity using centrifugal force. Firstly, we developed a simulation technique to estimate the dielectric permittivity distribution of FGM by considering the particle movement in a viscous fluid under centrifugal force. Secondly, based on the simulation technique, we fabricated FGM samples with various relative permittivity distribution and confirmed the validity of the simulation technique. Consequently, the fabrication results provided a good agreement with the simulation results.