Thermal analysis of disk-type transformer winding immersed in nanofluids using mixture and Eulerian-Lagrangian approach

A transformer plays a key role in the distribution network, and its overall performance is significantly affected by windings cooling. This paper presents a numerical study regarding the cooling of a disk-type winding in the presence of nanoparticles using single and mixture models to improve the thermal behavior of the transformer oil. Nanofluids are selected in two volumetric concentrations for multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) and three volumetric concentrations of diamond nanoparticles. Results demonstrate that the nanofluids decrease the temperature of the disks so that the diamond nanoparticles with a volumetric concentration of 0.05% reduce the average disk temperature by about 2 degrees C. The Lagrangian particle tracking method is also used to study particle sediments, which shows that about 7% of nanoparticles are deposited. Finally, it is shown that the thermal performance of nanofluids in overload improves with increasing load.

Automated summary

In this paper, a numerical study is conducted to investigate the effect of nanofluid cooling on transformer windings. The results show that nanofluids can significantly reduce the temperature of the windings and improve their thermal performance.