J.C. Gomez, M.M. Morcos, C. Reineri, G.

Campetelli

Induction Motor Behavior

Under Short Interruptions
and Voltage Sags
O

f all power quality issues, voltage sags and short interruptions are considered to be the main cause of more than
80% of the problems experienced by sensitive equipment. The
consequences of a power quality problem are sensitive equipment dropout and possible full-process or industrial-line disruption, with the obvious customer economic losses and
complaints. This type of problem occurs frequently due to the
increasing widespread of highly sensitive control equipment,
such as programmable logic controllers, adjustable speed
drives, and personal computers.
Customers normally suffer from the effect of the induction-motor and supply-system interaction, and utilities can experience significant loss of load [1]. The motor undervoltage
protection could trip the motor contactor if the supply voltage
stays too low for a long time [2]. New power quality requirements
have an important effect on the motor system interaction, for example, the increasingly popular motor fast reconnection to the
same source or to an alternative source. The load characteristics
during the reconnection instant are also critical for the motor behavior, since it is possible that
the motor would stall and not
start when the supply voltage is
restored [3].
Several reports related to
the modeling of induction motor behavior under voltage sag
conditions have been published, but only a few on
short-interruption behavior [2].
To the authors knowledge, no
extensive experimental study
on these two phenomena has
been available in the literature.
This article documents an experimental study that is the first

part of an extensive project with the goal of developing a simple

tool for the study of induction motor behavior and system effects
under short interruption and voltage sag conditions.

Short Interruptions and Voltage Sags

A short interruption is defined as the complete loss of voltage
(< 0.1 pu) on one or more phases for a time period between 0.5
cycles and 3 s. This phenomenon can be due to the supply interruption or due to the trip and subsequent reconnection by the
motor undervoltage protection. The present situation is more
severe than the normal motor start due to several reasons, such
as the motor generated voltage that is out of phase, heavily
loaded machinery, and a rigorous hot-load pickup. The industrial plant should have a reacceleration scheme in order to allow its production process restart without interfering with its
own sensitive equipment and with other customers connected
to the same supply system.
Without considering the induction motor effects, voltage
sags are normally represented by a square waveform [4]. Most

J.C. Gomez, C. Reineri, and G.

Campetelli are with the Electric
Power System Protection Institute,
Rio Cuarto National University, Rio
Cuarto, Cordoba, Argentina. M.M.
Morcos is with the Department of
Electrical and Computer Engineering, Kansas State University,
Manhattan, KS, United States.
IEEE Power Engineering Review, February 2001

Digital Vision Ltd.

0272-1724/01/$10.002001 IEEE

11

of the voltage sags lasted 10 cycles or less and were 20-30% in

magnitude. Transmission faults are usually cleared in less than 6
cycles, while distribution faults last between 10 and 20 cycles.
Voltage sag results in the initial reduction of the motor speed,
keeping for a while a higher voltage supplied by its internal, or
back, electromotive force (emf). When the voltage sag ends, the
motor speed increases, demanding more energy from the supply
until the steady-state speed is reached, hence, extending the
voltage sag duration. The load torque in this case shows very different characteristics as compared to normal startup conditions
(presence of compressor unloading valves, counter pressure, fan
dampers, etc.). The motor current is now a function of two phenomena, mechanical and electrical, each having its own time
constant. The presence of the induction motor causes a voltage
sag distortion, smoothing and prolonging the voltage variation.
The result is that some of the sensitive equipment that was able
to withstand the original voltage sag would drop out during the
post-sag period due to the induction motor effects. This indicates that the addition of motor loads to a system known to be
operating without harmful voltage sags can be critical to the sensitive equipment operation. It would be very convenient to determine the motor load limit for each particular system based on its
sensitive equipment.
The single line-to-ground fault is the most probable type of
fault and, through a delta-wye transformer, is transferred as a
two-phase voltage sag, in which case voltage sags should be
considered as a case of unbalanced transient supply.
Three-phase voltage sags (to the same level of the imbalance
sags) represent the worst stability condition [3]. Therefore, only
balanced phenomena were experimentally studied, leaving the
unbalanced behavior for future investigation.

oscillation with initial amplitude of 12%. The observed

oscillation seems to have constant frequency and exponential
amplitude-attenuation. The maximum values and oscillation
amplitudes are similar for both no-load and 85% rated load
starts, with start durations of approximately 0.18 s and 0.24 s,
respectively. The effect of the phase angle, at the instant of connecting the motor to the supply, on the maximum current peaks
is noticeable - ranging from 125 A to 148 A. It should be noted
that the voltage recovery is slower in the 85% rated load start
than in the no-load start.
No-Load and 85% Motor Rated Load Decelerations
Until Zero Speed due to Supply Interruption
The voltage drop follows a double-exponential variation due to
the speed reduction in addition to magnetic decays. The initial
value is the back emf that differs from the supply voltage by
13% for no-load and 17% for 85% rated load, respectively. Besides, the speed reduction is governed by the mechanical time
constant, which is proportional to the kinetic energy at the shaft
power. The magnetic decay is governed by the rotor-circuit time
constant. As the rotor resistance is a function of speed, the time
constant will change with the speed. Since the circuit is open,
the current goes immediately to zero.
The voltage measured values are easily fitted by the application of two time constants, 0.3 s for the magnetic phenomenon
and 27 s for no-load (or 0.44 s for 85% rated load) for the speed
change, which is very small for the time period considered in the
no-load case. Analytical and experimental values show an excellent agreement up to at least 0.2 s after the disconnection has
taken place, Figure 2.

Experimental Setup

150
100

Current (A)

The tested induction motor is a standard three-phase, squirrel-cage machine of the following ratings: 5.5 kW, 380 V, 50 Hz,
and 1,450 rpm. The load was based on an eddy-current brake,
having torque characteristics nearly proportional to the square
of speed. Voltage and current were measured and recorded
through a digital oscilloscope and a standard power data analyzer, both sampling 32 bits. The investigated voltage sags and
short interruptions were always balanced with a duration of approximately 5 cycles.

50
0
50
100
150
0

Test Cases and Results

No-Load and 85% Motor Rated Load Direct Starts

Steady-State Voltage: This test shows a small distortion (< 3%),
and very small voltage imbalance (< 1%) and a phase-to-phase
open circuit rms voltage of 390 V (slightly higher than rated).
Steady-State Current: This test shows distortion without low
frequency swings or oscillations, current imbalance higher than
voltage imbalance (approximately 3%), and steady-state no-load
and 85% load currents of 5.56 A and 9.38 A, respectively.
From the steady-state voltage and current oscillograms, no
important constructive asymmetries were detected.
Start Voltage: The voltage waveforms for both conditions
show a smooth increase caused by a normal start phenomenon
plus a slight oscillation. These slight voltage variations are due
to voltage drops caused by power oscillations.
Start Current: Figure 1 shows the characteristic shape (start
current approximately 8 times the rating value) and an important
12

0.1
Time (s)

0.15

0.2

Figure 1. Three-phase no-load direct start currents

600
500

Voltage (V)

In order to get a clear and step-by-step idea about the induction

motor behavior, the following tests were carried out.

0.05

400
300
200
100
0

0.2

0.4

0.6
0.8
Time (s)

1.2

1.4

Figure 2. Back emf decay for no-load motor and analytical exponential line
IEEE Power Engineering Review, February 2001

No-Load and 85% Motor Rated Load Decelerations

due to Supply Interruption During 5 Cycles
and then Reconnection to Supply
The voltage drop follows the previous double-exponential
variation. The same principle was applied to determine the
voltage difference (magnitude and phase angle) for the
reconnection instant (off time 96.7 ms and 93.5 ms for no-load
and 85% load, respectively), with a very good agreement between experimental values (0.375 pu for no-load and 1.35 pu
for 85% rated load) and analytical values (0.378 pu for no-load
and 1.46 pu for 85% rated load). The voltage difference measured for the loaded case is very close to the reclosing maximum allowed value of 1.33 pu. At the reconnection instant,
three transient phenomena take place that are due to three different processes:
Magnetic inrush current
Mechanical inrush current
Power oscillation.
The magnetic inrush is caused by the discrepancy between
the supply-established magnetic field and air-gap residual flux
(in spatial position and value). The mechanical inrush is due to
the difference between the actual and steady-state speeds. The
power oscillation is caused by the induction motor response to
the applied power step, generating several power interchanges
with negative and positive torque until passive loads smooth the
phenomenon down.
For the no-load case, the speed drop is very small, then the
reconnection takes place with small magnetic field and speed differences, showing overcurrent values not higher than 2.5 times

the rated current. There are also slight power oscillations with a
total transient duration shorter than the direct start phenomenon.
The situation is noticeably different for the loaded case,
where the reconnection is completely out of phase, showing a
large voltage shift [5]. The measured intensity values were
higher than the direct start currents, but their time duration was
shorter, showing 60% amplitude oscillations (Figure 3). The
voltage oscillations due to voltage drops on the circuit impedances are, therefore, more noticeable in the out-of-phase
reconnection than in the no-load case. The thermal effect produced by the reconnection current is only 53% of that corresponding to the 85% load start current.
No-Load and 85% Motor Rated Load Decelerations
due to Supply Short-Circuiting During 5 Cycles
and then Reconnection to the Supply
As soon as the motor terminals are short circuited, the voltage
falls sharply to zero. The three-phase currents follow the classical two-component short-circuit time variation. The dc component is attenuated by the stator time constant, and the ac
component is also attenuated due to the emf decay. Besides, the
energy dissipation process produces a new speed-variation time
constant, where the power value should now represent the
no-load losses, shaft load, and energy dissipation.
The analytical and experimental results have similar
waveshapes and values, clearly showing that the variation is
rather complex. For the motor under study, the current reaches
zero in approximately 80 to 100 ms, with half of the maximum
value in nearly one-third of the time. The Joules heat (or Joules
600

200

400

Voltage (V)

Current (A)

100

200
0
200

100

400
200

0.04

0.08
Time (s)

0.12

Figure 3. Reconnection current for 85% rated load motor

0.04

0.08
Time (s)

0.12

0.16

Figure 5. Voltage recovery after a 5.5-cycle short circuit with no-load motor

100

400

50

200

Voltage (V)

Current (A)

600

0.16

200

50

400

100
0

0.05

0.1

0.15
Time (s)

0.2

0.25

Figure 4. Short-circuit and reconnection currents for no-load motor

IEEE Power Engineering Review, February 2001

0.3

0.04

0.08
Time (s)

0.12

0.16

Figure 6. Voltage recovery after a 5.5-cycle short circuit with 85% rated loaded
motor
13

reaction. Figures 5 and 6 show the recovery voltages for no-load

and loaded cases, respectively. It can be seen that, in the no-load
case, the steady state is reached without great difficulties. However, in the loaded situation, the voltage is nearly stabilized at
65% of the presag value (torque is about 42% of the rated
torque), showing the difficulties that the induction motor is experiencing for the load reacceleration. The Joules heat for the
loaded reconnection at 0.3 s is already 2.3 times the total amount
for the no-load case.
No-Load and 85% Motor Rated Load
Voltage Sags to 45% During 5 Cycles
The voltage sag is an intermediate situation between the
open-circuit and short-circuit cases described previously. The
no-load and loaded voltage waveforms present slight differences during the low-voltage period. Besides, it can be seen that
the variation from 100% to 45% and back are not stepwise
changes. After the reconnection to 100% voltage, the slow voltage recovery for the loaded motor is noticeable, taking nearly
0.12 s to reach the steady-state value as opposed to only 60 ms
for the no-load case, as shown in Figure 7. During the on-sag period, the motor slows down, and a higher and more reactive current can be detected. At the moment of voltage recovery, a large
inrush current is present, which slows down the recovery process. The current magnitudes and durations were higher in the
loaded case than in the no-load case, and the oscillations were
more noticeable in the first case, as shown in Figure 8. From the
comparison with the direct start, it can be concluded that the

600

600

400

400

200

200

Voltage (V)

Voltage (V)

integral) of short-circuit currents is much smaller than that corresponding to the loaded-motor start current. The experimental
magnetic-decay time constant was 0.07 s, and the speed-reduction time constant was 0.09 to 0.1 s. This means that the generation process does not affect the short interruption waveform. In
this case, the first part of the short interruption (or voltage sag)
shows a stepwise waveshape.
The comparison between short-circuit currents with and
without mechanical load shows small differences. The no-load
motor short-circuit current is approximately 10-15% higher
than the loaded current case, and the attenuation of the loaded
case is slightly higher than the no-load situation.
At reconnection, the motor emf is practically zero, since the
magnetically stored energy has been dissipated in the rotor and
stator resistances. The voltage difference is virtually the supply
voltage, thus the current will follow the variation explained in
the previous case. The main difference is that the voltage recovery is rather slow now, lasting approximately 0.15 s and 0.65 s
for the no-load and 85 % rated load, respectively, and producing
smaller maximum current values, as shown in Figure 4. It
should be pointed out that the transient that lasted nearly 0.65 s
was caused by a short circuit present in the circuit for less than 6
cycles. The slow voltage recovery is due to the test circuit
hot-load pickup, which represents a typical industrial system. In
the 85% rated load case, the situation is drastically different because of the long reacceleration with a high Joules heat (current
is kept approximately constant at 60 A), which can cause thermal problems to the induction motor and a possible protection

0
200
400
600

0.05

0.1

0.15
Time (s)

0.2

0.25

600

0.3

80

80

40

40

0.05

0.1

0.15
Time (s)

0.2

0.25

0.3

0.2

0.25

0.3

Figure 9. Voltage sag to 30% during 5.4 cycles

Current (A)

Current (A)

200
400

Figure 7. Voltage sag to 43% during 5.5 cycles with 85% motor rated load

40

40

80
0

0.05

0.1

0.15
Time (s)

0.2

0.25

0.3

Figure 8. On-sag and post-sag currents for voltage sag to 43% during 5.5 cycles and 85% loaded motor
14

80

0.05

0.1

0.15
Time (s)

Figure 10. On-sag and post-sag currents for voltage sag to 30% for 85%
loaded motor
IEEE Power Engineering Review, February 2001

whole process was faster and that the reconnection maximum

current was nearly 50% of the direct-start maximum current.
85% Motor Rated Load Voltage Sags to
30%, 56%, 71%, and 85% During 5 Cycles
The observed behaviors were similar to the previous case. The
mentioned effects are very noticeable with the 30% voltage sag
being attenuated while the voltage sag increases from 30% to
85%. The current phase shift is evident in both the sag start and
end instants (Figures 9 and 10). The transient durations of voltage decrease and increase are reduced from 0.1-0.13 s to
0.03-0.025 s, as voltage sags change
from 30% to 85%. The on-sag and
reconnection peak-current to load-current relationships move from 2.9-5 to
1.2-1.9, while the voltage sags change
from 30% to 85%.

Conclusions
From the experimental study related to
short interruptions and balanced voltage sags, the following conclusions can
be drawn.
The induction motor greatly influences the voltage sag waveform
and duration.
There are situations where the system recovery can be seriously affected by the induction motor
presence.
The motor-load characteristics
should be considered in voltage sag
studies.
The on-sag and post-sag currents
can reach levels higher than the direct start values and the post-sag
overcurrent duration can last more
than twice the normal start time
period.
The circuit hot-load pickup together
with the motor load can drastically
extend or delay the reacceleration
process and, in particular cases, prevent the start completely.
The worst case is related with the
motor size, system hot-load pickup,
and shaft load characteristics.
Knowledge of the circuit hot-load
pickup characteristics is decisive in
order to get a reasonable accurate
circuit representation for short-interruption and voltage-sag studies.

IEE Proc. Generation, Transmission and Distribution, vol. 143,

1996, pp. 56-60.
[3] J.C. Das, Effects of momentary voltage dips on the operation of induction and synchronous motors, IEEE Trans. Ind.
Applicat., vol. 26, 1990, pp. 711-718.
[4] M.H.J. Bollen, The influence of motor reacceleration on
voltage sags, IEEE Trans. Ind. Applicat., vol. 31, 1995, pp.
667-674.
[5] T.S. Key, Predicting behavior of induction motors during service faults and interruptions, IEEE Ind. Applicat. Mag.,
January/February 1995, pp. 6-11.

2002 IEEE Fellow Nominations

Deadline: 15 March 2001

Recognizing the achievements of its members is an important part of the mission of

the IEEE. The IEEE grade of Fellow is conferred upon a person of outstanding and extraordinary qualifications and experience in IEEE designated fields, and who has made
important individual contributions to one or more of these fields. The total number of
Fellows selected each year does not exceed 0.1% of the total IEEE membership.
The number of IEEE Fellow nominations for PES members has declined in recent years.
As a result, fewer of our colleagues were considered for the recognition that they deserve
through their contributions to power engineering. Many of our PES colleagues made significant contributions to the profession through their work in engineering, technical leadership, and education. As a professional community, we need to be more proactive in
nominating our colleagues for this significant award.
Any person, including a nonmember, is eligible to serve as a nominator with the following exceptions: members of the IEEE Board of Directors, members of the IEEE Fellow
Committee, IEEE Technical Society/Council Fellow Evaluating Committee Chairs, members of IEEE Technical Society/Council Evaluating Committees reviewing the nomination,
or IEEE staff. The deadline for nominations is 15 March 2001.
The candidate must be an IEEE Senior Member at the time the nomination is submitted,
and he/she must have completed 5 years of service in any grade of IEEE membership.
All the necessary material to assist you in the nomination process is available on the IEEE
Web site: http://www.ieee.org/about/awards/fellows/fellows.htm. If you prefer a hard copy,
please send an e-mail to fellow-kit@ieee.org. Include your name, street address, city,
state/province, postal code, country, and telephone/fax numbers. For more information,
contact Chen-Ching Liu, PES Fellows Committee chair, liu@ee.washington.edu.

References
[1] J.W. Shaffer, Air conditioner response to transmission faults, IEEE
Trans. Power Syst., vol. 12, 1997, pp.
614-621.
[2] M.H.J. Bollen, P.M.E. Dirix,
Simple model for post-fault motor behavior for reliability/power quality assessment of industrial power systems,
IEEE Power Engineering Review, February 2001

15