A technique for rapid measurement of high-voltage conductivity of dielectric liquids

The paper presents a ready-to-use experimental technique for rapid measurement of high-voltage conductivity with some examples being given to demonstrate the importance of its application. The so-called dynamical current–voltage characteristics, i.e., those obtained with the voltage modulation by a saw-tooth signal, underlie the proposed technique. Cells with blade-plane and needle-plane electrode systems are used. In such systems, the distribution of electric field strength is highly non-uniform, which lets one obtain very high values of the strength near the electrode tip avoiding the electrical breakdown of the whole interelectrode gap. Due to the rapidity of the corresponding measurements, the technique has a number of advantages. They are the possibility to carry out data acquisition…