Calculations based on measurements of charge deposited by a streamer on a PTFE surface

Surface charge on an insulator's surface is studied using 3-dimensional finite element modelling. The calculations are based on measurements of surface charge deposited by a streamer on a PTFE surface. The surface electric field strengths associated with uniform surface charge density distributions over a 1 mm/sup 2/ region are calculated for a range of different measured charge densities. The effect of reducing the area of the surface charge whilst keeping the total amount of charge in the region constant is observed. The surface charge is then modelled with a Gaussian distribution of charge and compared to that of a uniform distribution. By assuming a maximum allowable surface electric field strength an estimation of actual charged path diameter is made.