End goals include long service life, ease of production and some optimized combination of cost and performance. Today, ceramic bodies of porcelain insulators are prepared according to precise recipes that involve compromise in the relative proportions of the different ingredients. Both allow porcelain to be shaped into large pieces without deformation and also to be fired with no release of gases that might result in unwanted porosity within the body. Other key parameters included fine grain size and low residue content. Increased focus was placed on strength as well as on high plasticity and good drying behavior, with minimal presence of organic matter. Art memorialized era when production of porcelain insulators was by hand.Īs voltages continued to increase and insulators of larger dimension became necessary, the attributes required of clays became more and more demanding. Soon, porcelain began to replace glass for most electrical distribution applications due to perceived superior insulation quality and strength. Industry pioneers began to experiment with mixtures of clay that would yield insulators having the desired electrical and mechanical properties. As electrical distribution began to develop in the 1880s, better quality insulators were needed to carry the voltages of overhead power lines. These were crude pieces produced in smaller volume than alternatives made from glass, which were cheaper. Due to continuous refinements in composition, processing and testing, modern electrical porcelain has remained the most widely used insulator technology found at substations the world over, in spite of growing inroads by advanced alternative technologies.Įlectrical porcelain has a history going back 150 years to the time when small-scale pottery firms first began making telegraph insulators. Yet while looking much the same as what was crafted by hand decades ago, porcelain insulators today share little in common with their comparatively crude ancestors. Glazed porcelain insulators are such a product. One would have to think hard to find any product that was state-of-the-art over a century ago and still widely considered as the leading technology today.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |