Losses in Transformer

By:
Ankit Srivastava
Assistant Professor
Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department
Content
• Introduction
• Equivalent Circuit of Transformer
• Iron losses
• Copper losses
• Stray losses
• Dielectric losses
Introduction
• In any electrical machine, 'loss’ can be defined as the difference
between input power and output power.
• An electrical transformer is an static device, hence mechanical losses
(like windage or friction losses) are absent in it.
• A transformer only consists of electrical losses (iron losses and
copper losses).
• All these losses in the transformer are dissipated in the form of heat.
Equivalent Circuit of Transformer
Iron losses
• These losses occur in the core of the transformer and are generated
due to the variations in the flux.
• They depend upon the magnetic properties of the material used for
the construction of core. Hence these losses are also known as core
losses or iron losses (Wi).
• Iron losses are of two type Eddy current and Hysteresis loss.
Eddy Current Losses
• In transformer, the leakage magnetic flux linked with the conducting parts like steel
core or iron body of the transformer, which will result in induced emf in those parts,
causing small circulating current in them.

Ke – coefficient of eddy current. Its value depends upon the nature of magnetic material
like volume and resistivity of core material, the thickness of laminations
Bm – maximum value of flux density in wb/m2
T – thickness of lamination in meters
F – frequency of reversal of the magnetic field in Hz
V – the volume of magnetic material in m3
• This current is called as eddy current. Due to these eddy currents,
some energy will be dissipated in the form of heat.

• Lamination of core material can reduce eddy current loss.

Hysteresis losses
• Hysteresis loss is due to the repeated magnetization and
demagnetization in the transformer core. The energy is lost in each
hysteresis cycle.
• This loss depends upon the volume and grade of the iron, frequency of magnetic
reversals and value of flux density. It can be given by,

KȠ is a proportionality constant which depends upon the volume and quality of the
material of the core used in the transformer,
f is the supply frequency,
Bmax is the maximum or peak value of the flux density.

• Soft magnetic materials with low hysteresis such as silicon steel and CRGO Steel
are usually used in core to reduce the loss .
Copper losses

• Copper loss is due to power wasted in the form of I2R, , where ‘I’ is
the current passing through the windings and R is the internal
resistance of the windings(primary and secondary).
• It is clear that Cu loss is proportional to square of the current, and
current depends on the load. Hence copper loss in transformer
varies with the load.
•Hence it is also called as variable loss.
Wcut= I2pRp + I2sRs
Stray losses

• The stray losses is due to the presence of leakage field including eddy
currents in tank walls and conductors.
• The winding of the transformer should be designed such a way to
minimize the stray loss this is achieved by splitting of conductors
into small strips to reduce eddy current loss.
Dielectric losses

• Dielectric loss occurs in the insulating material of the transformer

that is in the oil of the transformer, or in the solid insulations.
• When the oil gets deteriorated or the solid insulation get damaged,
or its quality decreases and because of this, the efficiency of
transformer is effected.
• The percentage of these losses are very small as compared to the
iron and copper losses so they can be neglected.
Efficiency of Transformer
•The Efficiency of the transformer is defined as the ratio power output
to the real power input.

• In any practical transformer there is losses hence the efficiency is,

Thank You