Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 215}216 (2000) 634}636

Relevance of multidirectional magnetostriction for the noise

generation of transformer cores
C. Krell*, N. Baumgartinger, G. Krismanic, E. Leiss, H. PfuK tzner
Inst. of Fundamentals and Theory of Electrotechnics, Bioelectricity and Magnetism Lab., University of Technology,
Gusshausstr. 27-351, A-1040 Vienna, Austria

Abstract

As well known, T-joint regions of three-phase transformer cores tend to show rotational magnetisation (RM) patterns
which yield distinct increases of magnetostriction. The present work was focused on the question whether these local
phenomena exhibit practical relevance for the core's global magnetostriction-caused strain. A main e!ect was found for
the yoke's horizontal direction, RM causing about 80% increase of total strain in the T-joint region and 40% for the total
yoke.  2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Silicon iron; Multidirectional magnetostriction; Noise; Transformer cores

1. Introduction arises in the r.d., irrespective of the time pattern of mag-

Traditionally, the most important demand for trans-
former cores is given by low values of no-load losses.
However, increased environmental consciousness yields
a second demand, i.e. low generation of audible noise.
The latter is caused by core vibrations which result from
both magnetostriction (MS) and magnetostatic forces.
Contributions from MS are usually estimated on the
basis of #ux distributions which are modelled, e.g., by
means of "nite element method. The usual procedure is
to solve the "eld problem B(x, y) in the xy-plane of
laminations and to assume for all sub-regions corre-
sponding MS-caused strain values j which are based on
experimental determination. The latter is usually per-
formed by measurements on single strips of material
which are cut and magnetised in di!erent angles t to the
rolling direction (r.d.). Conventionally, also j is measured
in axial strip direction, i.e. parallel to B. However, experi-
mental results from a novel hexagonal &rotational'
single-sheet tester (RSST) have shown that this procedure
is strongly misleading for the case of grain oriented (g.o.)
SiFe due to the fact that maximum MS-caused strain
* Corresponding author. Tel.: #43-1-58801-35-1-10; fax:
#43-1-58801-351-99.
E-mail address: christian.krell@tuwien.ac.at (C. Krell).
netisation (see Fig. 1, after Refs. [1,2]).
2. Methods
Experiments were performed on a 1 m;1 m model
core built up from g.o. SiFe (M5-30). The number of
laminations was 56. Both limbs and yokes showed
a width D"200 mm (Fig. 2). For a total magnetisation
of 1.7 T (50 Hz), local magnetisation patterns B(x, y, t)
were determined at 116 points of the core. The measure-
ment was performed in a central cooling duct by means
of a hand-held sensor [3,4]. The detected patterns were
simulated on the RSST in rough approximation, and the
corresponding magnetostriction (MS) was measured for
all directions of the sheet plane. Finally, the MS values
were allocated to the 116 points, and the resulting strain
values were estimated for the core-regions 1 to 11 as well
as for the central axes 1, 2 and 3 of the lower limb
halves and the central axis > of the lower yoke (see Fig. 2).
3. Results and discussion
As demonstrated by Fig. 2, the 116 core points show
patterns B(x, y, t) which are characterised by almost pure

0304-8853/00/$ - see front matter  2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
PII: S 0 3 0 4 - 8 8 5 3 ( 0 0 ) 0 0 2 4 7 - X
 C. Krell et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 215}216 (2000) 634}636 635

Table 1
Numerical results of analysis for the core regions 0}11

Region e j r r
      
(lm/m)

0 0
0.75 1
1 0.04 0.95 1.27
2 0.05 0.96 1.29
3 0.03 0.89 1.20
Fig. 1. MS-caused strain for the time instants of B (a) in t.d. and 4 0.06 1.02 1.37 0.69
(b) t.d. for an elliptical magnetisation pattern (e"0.5, 5 0.07 1.09 1.47 0.74
B "1.7 T). 6 0.09 1.18 1.58
  7 0.12 1.34 1.80 0.90
8 0.06 1.05 1.41
9 0.05 1.01 1.35 0.68
alternating magnetisation (AM) in the outer limb regions
10 0.03 0.89 1.20 0.60
1 and 3. The yoke regions 5}9 show rhombic rotational 11 0.08 1.11 1.49 0.75
magnetisation (RM), while the regions 4, 10, 2 and 11
show a tendency of sectional RM. For simplicity, these Mean amplitude ratio e as determined from B-patterns mea-
patterns were characterised by regional amplitude ratios sured at 116 points. Mean MS peak-to-peak value j as
  
de"ned as determined by means of RSST simulations. Mean r-values
(MS related to the case of sinusodial magnetisation in r.d.)
e"BK /BK (1) r and r
   
   
Assumption of sinusoidal input in r.d.
(t.d. :"transverse direction) irrespective of the type of
RM (rhombic or sectional). According to Table 1, in the Fig. 3 shows results of the RSST simulation for the
coil regions * which did not allow access for the hand- whole range e"0 (pure AM) up to e"1 (circular RM).
held sensor * e"0 was assumed, i.e. pure AM in r.d. In Here, MS is given related to the case of e"0 by the
the other regions, e ranged between 0.03 and 0.12 which r-factor
means that rather weak deviations from the r.d. were
detected compared to reports of other authors. r (e)"j (e)/j (e"0), (2)
       

Fig. 2. Model core divided into 11 regions and the corresponding measured B-patterns.
636 C. Krell et al. / Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials 215}216 (2000) 634}636

This 37% excess strain is confronted by considerably

lower values for the limb axes 1, 2, and 3 which
yielded 13%, 19% and 6%, respectively.

4. Conclusion

We conclude that phenomena of rotational magnetisa-

tion show practical relevance especially for those contri-
butions to noise which result from the strain of the yoke
axes. The suggested experimental procedure includes sev-
eral simpli"cations. However, it can be assumed that the
orders of strain are estimated in an e!ective way.

Fig. 3. Measured r-factor as a function of e for three values of

B as measured by means of RSST. Acknowledgements
 
We thank for support from the Austrian FWF (Project
10968-PHY) and from ABB Power T&D Comp. (St.
which expresses in a simple way the increase of strain Louis, USA).
in r.d. that results from phenomena of RM. j "
  
"j B !j B " expresses the peak-to-peak
           
value of MS-caused strain as resulting from the instant of References
time where B passes through the transverse direction
(t.d.) (t"903; Fig. 1a) and through the r.d. (t"0; [1] A. Hasenzagl, B. Weiser, H. PfuK tzner, J. Magn. Magn.
Fig. 1b), respectively. Table 1 shows the factors r for Mater. 160 (1996) 55.
  [2] A. Hasenzagl, H. PfuK tzner, A. Saito, Y. Okazaki, Proceed-
the core-regions. As to be expected, the highest value
resulted for the central yoke region 7, r "1,8 indicat- ings of the "fth International WS 2-D Magnetisation Prob-
  lems, Grenoble, 1997, p. 33.
ing an 80% increase of MS compared to optimum condi-
[3] G. Krismanic, H. PfuK tzner, N. Baumgartinger, J. Magn.
tions. Finally, attempts were made to estimate global Magn. Mater., These Proceedings.
increases of MS-caused strain for the main core axes [4] G. Krismanic, H. PfuK tzner, N. Baumgartinger, J. Magn.
1, 2, 3 and >. For simplicity, the corresponding Magn. Mater., These Proceedings.
mean r-factors were calculated under the assumption
that regions which are magnetised mainly in t.d. show
50% of excess MS (c.f. Refs. [1,2]), corresponding to
r "0.5r . The following formula structure was used
   
to estimate the mean global r-factor along any axis
(1, 2, 3 or >):
l )r # l ) r
r " G G   G H H   H , (3)
  l # l
GG HH
where l is the lenght of a region, the r.d. of which is
G
parallel to the considered axis (l for t.d. parallel to the
H
axis). For example, for the total yoke (axis >; point a to
point b in Fig. 2), this procedure yields with data from
Table 1

(D/2)(r #r #r #r )#D(r #r #r )
r"                      "1.37.
W 5D