The Performance of Nano-Coating for High Voltage Insulators

Porcelain and glass insulators have a low hydrophobicity surface property. Because of the leakage current flowing on the insulator's wetted polluted surface, dry band arcs and complete insulator flashover may result. Utilities have used RTV coatings and greasing to improve the surface properties of the insulators. Although effective, these remedies are labour intensive and expensive. A recent proposal is the application of a nano-coating on the surface of the insulator. In this work, the performance a "Voltshield" nano-coating material is investigated under artificial pollution conditions using the solid layer method of IEC60507. The results of a comparison study between nano-coated and standard insulators showed that the nano-coated porcelain insulators perform better than the standard porcelain insulators under standard clean-fog tests, both in suppressing the leakage current activities and retaining its surface hydrophobicity.