Identification of wavefronts in Partial Discharge acoustic signals using discrete wavelet transform

This paper describes a method to discriminate the wavefront of the acoustic signal obtained from Partial Discharges. The technique used here takes advantage of the Wavelet Transform in order to extract, in a very precise way, the characteristics related to the desired wavefront. This information is used to locate the source of the Partial Discharge occurring in oil-insulated Power Transformers. The methodology to find the correct spot of the Partial Discharge uses Genetic Algorithm to solve a set of non-linear equations. Practical results are shown and the methodology is described in detail.