Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
(OP)
A 60 MW, 3000 RPM steam turbine generator went into motoring and the protection system failed to catch it (DC failure). The machine was tripped manually and the it was resynchronized. But the generator vibrations shot up.
The machine was stopped and the generator and the turbine bearings were inspected and found ok. It was then restarted and the vibrations were found to increase with the excitation. On tripping the excitation, the vibration went down immediately obviously indicating electrical issues.
Questions to ScottyUK, epete and other generator aces.
Will the motoring action affect the generator rotor winding ? What about the stator winding and the core ? What are the checks to be done on the generator after such motoring ?
The machine was stopped and the generator and the turbine bearings were inspected and found ok. It was then restarted and the vibrations were found to increase with the excitation. On tripping the excitation, the vibration went down immediately obviously indicating electrical issues.
Questions to ScottyUK, epete and other generator aces.
Will the motoring action affect the generator rotor winding ? What about the stator winding and the core ? What are the checks to be done on the generator after such motoring ?
Muthu
www.edison.co.in





RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Muthu
www.edison.co.in
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Few more questions first:
How long was it motoring for?
What type of exciter: sliprings; rotating rectifier; other?
Did the field remain energised?
Did the condenser break vacuum?
Is the vibration problem immediately apparent or does it build after a period of time?
FWIW I'd pretty much discount any possibility of problems on the stator and core - if there's damage to the generator it will likely be on the rotor or in the auxiliaries.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Muthu
www.edison.co.in
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
As dpc has already noted, the reverse power relay is primarily to protect the turbine LP rotor, but if vacuum was maintained - as it appears to have been - then there should not be any danger of the LP blading being damaged by frictional heating due to windage.
How fast does the vibration come up with excitation? A very fast response would suggest assymmetry in the rotor field, while a slower response would suggest a thermal bend. Both could be attributed to a shorted turn or partial winding failure. I'd get the unit down to a stationary condition and megger the rotor at 2x working voltage from winding to the rotor forging, then do an accurate DC resistance measurement and compare with OEM data. You're probably happy enough doing that - only comment I'd make is make sure you know where and how the OEM measurements were taken.
Do you have records of what balance weights were fitted to the machine and in which locations? Check they're all still there.
Have you got any support from the vibration analysis guys or are you on your own with this? Also what data does the machine historian collect? Most DCS and turbine control systems can be persuaded to talk to a Bently Nevada 3300 system (or anything of later vintage) via a data link, and that lets you get a lot more data. Get it added to the historian so you can trend machine parameters alongside vibration.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
That bomb got lobbed at me today afternoon. There is lot that is left unsaid in that communication to me. I talked with a low level engineer and asked him about the vibration behavior with excitation. He told me that the vibration drops immediately upon switching off the excitation. That and the increasing vibration levels with load seem to indicate some rotor turn shorts.
I have been asked to study the issue including any new vib analysis. They have the machine shut down now. I plan to be at the site this weekend. I plan on doing a megger, IR and AC impedance measurement.
And I will come back here with more questions. :)
Sorry to bother you during the holidays.
Muthu
www.edison.co.in
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
I agree with above comments. Reverse power protection is for the prime mover.
If power was reduced to low level before securing the turbine, there is no reason to suspect any unusual swings of the generator against the system that might create a pole slip. (Even if turbine was at full power and its valve suddenly closed, the reverse angle swing shouldn't exceed the initial angle... nowhere near any stability limits). All this assumes the excitation remained properly controlled.
Similar to the comments above, it is natural to start thinking about whether the excitation system worked properly. Maybe whatever malfunctions occurred with the DCS and the tripping functions may have also affected the excitation control system and loss of excitation protection (?). For example voltage signal fed from DCS to AVR ?
Both underexcitation and overexcitation are problems. Overexcitation - overheating of rotor conductors based on I^2*R and heating of stator iron based on core losses. Underexcitation/loss of excitation ... as mentioned a loss of excitation turns it into an induction motor or generator. It was mentioned it is a problem for armortisseur windings... I think it can also be a big problem for the rotor iron and retaining ring in a high-speed smooth rotor ...rotor teeth have no laminations and act like rotor bars of a SCIM, the retaining rings act like end rings of a SCIM. For smooth rotor generator, loss of field culd also create heating of stator end-iron due to axial leakge flux when retaining ring drops out of saturation and leakage between stator end iron and rotor increases.
For that matter, the DCS malfunction may have also created problems for temperature control of hydrogen / stator cooling water, seal oil (?)
By the way, the units of vibration I assume are microns? Why are there two numbers per location per direction?
There is no obvious smoking gun or target to go after that I can see. Best keep an open mind going in there.
You know better than me what and how to test.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
I will come back next week with more details.
Muthu
www.edison.co.in
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Running as an induction machine is definitely something to look for. The report said the unit didn't slow down, but would be interesting to see if it did actually drop to a sub-synchronous speed. Look at the data from the machine historian, but do not treat the data as gospel truth: sometimes sampling periods and deadbands can make things appear to happen (or not happen), and also to change the apparent sequence they occured in.
ePete,
Yes, agreed about effect on teeth of high speed rotor. Should have mentioned that myself - thanks for the good explanation. How serious would stator end heating when the stator currents involved are relatively low and the rotor field is absent?
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Looking at the sequence of events:
1> DCS failure. Investigation may reveal more than one function has failed.
2> Unit failed to trip.
3> Unit motoring.
4> Steam shut off manually.
5>Breaker tripped manually.
The following issues are suggested:
Multiple DCS failures.
The excitation did trip but the steam and breaker trips failed.
Following the loss of excitation the unit motored as an induction motor for long enough to damage the rotor windings.
It may be well to review the configuration of the DCS safety routines, both the software and the hardware implementations.
Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Rafiq Bulsara
http://www.srengineersct.com
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
"....I have stood on the shoulders of giants."
An attempt to summarize the posts of those who preceded me.
Yours
Bill
Bill
--------------------
"Why not the best?"
Jimmy Carter
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
That in itself is an important skill and virtue of a consultant, sifting through the pile of information and zeroing on the important ones.
Regards,
Rafiq
Rafiq Bulsara
http://www.srengineersct.com
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
My simplistic viewpoint starts with the P vs Q generator capability curve. We have stator core end overheating possible when leading Q is more than a limit (even when P=0). Low field current is the more severe condition. Zero field current would seem to be an extreme of lowering the field current... although the curve was clearly not intended to cover that scenario so it may not be correct logic.
Beyond trying to extrapolate the P-Q capability curve into new territory, we try to look for the physical mechanism which I certainly don't completely understand. An excerpt from "Protective Relaying for Power Generation Systems" (go to pages 254 and 255)
ht
Out of that reference I get two concepts:
1 – The reluctance path for endleakage flux is affected by flux level in the retaining ring. Low excitation decreases reluctance and increases axial endleakage. (2nd full paragraph on page 255)
2 – The mmf driving flux through that reluctance (of retaining ring in series with air) is assumed by this reference roughly proportional to to airgap flux (last 2 paragraphs on page 255).
Which of above 2 effects is more important? I vote the 1st one since retaining ring is in a strategic location and it's reluctance can change by many orders of magnitude. In contrast the airgap flux and mmf does not change by much when connected to a constant voltage system (only the voltage drop accross the synchronous stator reactance). So far, it seems to support my conclusion about effect of long-term operation.
You'll note whenever this references cites the effects of underexcited operation, they refer only to retaining ring reluctance and airgap flux. They never talk about relative phase of the respective leakage flux from rotor end connections and stator endturns, which I have heard mentioned as an aggravating factor in some other references. The phase relationship is easily understood by looking at a stationary location in the airgap: rotor flux in phase with rotor current, airgap voltage lags rotor flux by 90 degrees (by Faraday's law), and assuming small stator leakage reactance, stator current leads airgap flux by 90 degrees for a pure capacitive load (P=0, Q<0), and therefore stator current in phase with rotor current for pure capacitive load, so leakage fluxes add at a given location. This aggravating effect is completely absent in the loss of field scenario as I think Scotty was pointing out. I don't know the relative importance of all these factors compared to each other.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
"stator current leads airgap flux by 90 degrees for a pure capacitive load"
should have been
"stator current leads airgap voltage by 90 degrees for a pure capacitive load"
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
I've quoted the following which supports your suggestion from "Operation & Maintenance of Large Turbo-Generators" - published by the IEEE, it is a useful reference book.
Unexcited Operation (''Loss-of-Field'' Condition)
Operation without field current is potentially dangerous and can occur under a number of circumstances. The following are the most common two:
Loss of field during operation. If for some reason the field current goes to zero while the generator is connected to the system, the machine starts acting as an induction generator. The rotor operates at a speed slightly higher than synchronous speed and slip-frequency currents are developed. These penetrate deep into the rotor body because they are of low frequency (this does not represent the skin effect discussed in case 2, below). Severe arcing between rotor components and heavy heating may result. The ends of the stator core also experience heating due to stray fluxes in the end region, more severely than for operation at underexcited power factor. Protection is commonly provided to prevent or minimize the duration of this mode of operation, by the so-called loss-of-field relay.
<The other case was inadvertent energisation, which wasn't germane to this discussion>
There's also a useful diagram on page 46 of this book which is worth studying to better understand the stray flux problem and why it occurs at leading power factors.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Rotor impedance - 8.07 ohms average (at voltages varying from 10 to 70 V, 50 Hz and the readings are fluctuating from 7.74 ohms to 8.36 ohms). The rotor IR is 5 megohms at 500 V.
They have an earlier rotor impedance value measured at 9.8 - 10.0 ohms when the rotor was outside the stator for an earlier overhaul.
Question - will the rotor impedance change when it is inside the stator ?
I have advised them to thread out the rotor to check both the rotor and the stator. Will a RSO test clearly determine the rotor turn-shorts ?
Muthu
www.edison.co.in
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Scotty - What is that IEEE std no. ?
Muthu
www.edison.co.in
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
If you do pull the rotor, recommend that the client fits an air gap search coil into the bore. With the right tools it will provide valuable diagnostic information while the set is running, so things like faults which only become apparent at running speed can be detected.
The IEEE document is actually a book, not a standard: ISBN 0-471-61447-5, $120 from IEEE. On of my employer's better purchasing decisions.
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If we learn from our mistakes I'm getting a great education!
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Let's say we used the same current level for testing rotor alone and rotor within stator. That constant current provides a constant mmf. When we add the stator, the reluctance is lower and Flux = mmf/Reluctance is higher. V=N*dPhi/dt is higher.
L ~ V/I is higher.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Aditya has provided data on maintenanceforums.com showing that the BJM AllTestPro tests with varying frequency (I/f, Fi/f)can be very good for finding rotor shorts (more sensitive than power frequency test). I think it is best when a comparison is made among identical winding sections. I'm not sure if that is possible with your 2 pole.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
"Take a core wound around a hollow plastic tube..."
should have been:
"Take a coil wound around a hollow plastic tube.."
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Thanks pete. I agree. My 'intuition' too says that the rotor impedance should go up when it is inside the stator. I base this on the fact the current drawn by an empty stator is much more than when the rotor is inside.
Could you possibly post that maintenanceforums link on RSO and BJM alltestpro ?
Muthu
www.edison.co.in
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
http:
See Aditya's post 8 April 2008 08:23 AM with attachment labeled "11-KBX-203" and his followup discussion 10 April 2008 05:34 AM
Attached is the test data from that thread. Look at page 12/26 section labeled "15 – Winding Circuit Analysis of New Poles Before Installation (All Test AT-31)" It is a series of tests of new salient poles 1 thru 30 (poles are the vertical axis of the table) for varying frequencies (frequency is the horizontal axis of the table). Poles 2 and 8 have an anomaly which I believe is a shorted turn later agreed by the pole OEM based on the discussion.
The difference between poles 2/8 compared to the remaining poles is very small at lower frequency, but becomes very obvious at higher frequency.
I have a simplistic theory why the higher frequency test can be more sensitive:
Note So there you have it – supporting test data and a half-baked theory. From what I gather Aditya has a lot of experience testing generators and their rotors, and thinks that is one of the big benefits of the All Test Pro – detecting shorted rotor turns. Although I don't think he uses it alone, he combines it with traditional power frequency ac test. (Maybe he will comment instead of me putting words in his mouth) And it should be noted the actual measurement accuracy of ATP can be fairly low as has been the subject of much discussion on that forum.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
There is an ASSUMPTION built into the above prediction.
The assumption is that the stator is wye connected and there are no grounds or shorts across the line terminals.
I'm pretty sure a generator this size would be wye, not delta, so probably no problem there.
However if there were safety grounds hung on the terminals, then it is like the rotor is a transformer primary and the stator is like a shorted transformer secondary. This could cause the ac impedance to decrease below the value that would be seen when testing rotor alone.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Could you tell me that the stator has to be connected in wye for the rotor to show impedance? I regularly test delta wound stators with and without the rotor and the current is exceedingly high when the rotor is not inside the stator due to lack of back-emf.
Muthu
www.edison.co.in
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
Muthu
www.edison.co.in
RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
If the stator is connected in wye (and there are no grounds or short circuits connected), then the only relevant stator effect is the iron and the answer is easy. That it what I initially focused on - adding iron makes inductance (and therefore impedance) go up.
But if the stator is connected in delta (or the stator is wye with grounded or shorted terminals), then in addition to the effects of stator iron, we need to also consider the effects of possible induced stator winding currents. IF (*) stator current were induced, that would cause a decrease in impedance and we have two effects acting in opposite direction... it's not obvious which one will win.
* Will there be currents induced? I didn't think about it carefully before because I didn't think it was likely a 60MW machine would be delta connected. With a little more thought, I suspect if the rotor is aligned with A phase, when peak A phase voltage is induced, B and C phase will each see half the voltage with the opposite polarity, net voltage around the delta loop would be 0. So it probably does not make a big difference.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
The wye with shorted terminals (such as safety grounds) is easier. If rotor field creates max + voltage at A at a given moment in time, any voltage in b and c at that time would be negative (which increases the voltage difference to A phase). It doesn't matter balanced or not, there would be current induced.
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RE: Motoring effects on a steam turbine generator
For example if I energized the entire rotor with normal connections from single phase ac supply, we would expect voltages at any point in time to be a snapshot of a three-phase symmetric balanced set.... and therefore sum to zero. For example we would expect voltages something like:
Va = 1*sin(w*t)
Vb = -0.5*sin(w*t)
Vc = -0.5*sin(w*t)
The voltages satisfy a sum-to-zero balance.
Whereas if we energize only a portion of the rotor during the test, the flux distribution is more of an unknown, and we don't know if sum-to-zero voltage will apply.
The distinction is important for predicting circulating currents in a delta since the driving total voltage is deviation of the sum of voltages from 0.
The distinction is not so important for prediciting circulating currents in wye with safety grounds on all 3 phases...we will have induced currents whether or not the voltages sum to zero.
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