Useful And Essential Facts About Insulation Tester

By Barbara Morgan


In a perfect world, current that is sent along a conductive wire is supposed to reach the intended destination in full. However, this does not happen in the real world because some of the current is usually lost along the way. There are different reasons why the current gets lost along the way. In an attempt to prevent the loss of current, resistant sheathing is used to insulate conductive wires. Here are facts regarding Insulation tester.

Sometimes the current is lost if the insulating sheath is made from imperfect materials. Machinery and electric circuits are greatly affected when there is leakage of current due to imperfect cladding. Such a case can be controlled by frequently testing the insulating material to determine its perfectness. Testing the material frequently can help to catch problems in advance before injuries or device failure happens because of loss of current.

This testing process is done using a pieces of equipment referred to as an cladding tester. The equipment tests the integrity of the cladding by measuring its resistance to the flow of current across it. If the cladding is of high quality, it means that very little current will escape through it. On the contrary, if the cladding offers very little resistance, then a higher amount of current will flow across it.

When measuring the quality of material used to make the sheath, different kinds of current are tested. Absorption, leakage and capacitive currents are the three main types of current tested. The current that occurs immediately when voltage is applied to conductors is referred to as capacitive current.

Capacitive current is similar to the first burst of water from a hose. The initial burst is usually very high, but it then reduces very fast. The drop is caused by the fact that the hose becomes filled with water after a sort while and the flow of water becomes steady. In the case of electricity, the conductor becomes fully charged, hence the drop in current flow.

Just like capacitive current, absorption current initially flows in large amount before dropping. However, the rate at which absorption current drops is much lower compared to that of capacitive current. Potential energy is stored in the cladding making the flow of absorption current to drop gradually. When testing the cladding of a material using time resistance method, absorption current is a very important aspect.

The third type of current tested is leakage current, which is also called conduction current. Unlike the other currents which drop over time, this type of current is small and steady. The current occurs both over and through the insulating sheath. Sheath that deteriorates in quality over time causes the leakage current to increase as time passes. The increase in leakage current as resistance decreases is indicated by an insulation test meter.

Currently, different types of cladding testers are available in the market. Different manufacturers from different countries produce these devices. The manufacturer of the equipment largely influences its quality. Different models of cladding testers are used to perform different functions. For instance, some testers are designed to perform testing in residential settings while other testers are meant to be used for testing equipment in industries.




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