2004 LEEWPES Transmission & Distribution Conference & Exposition: Latin America I

A New Fomulation for Skin-effect Resistance and

Internal Inductance Frequency-Dependent of a Solid
Cylindrical Conductor
Omar M. 0. Gatous, and J. Pissolato Filho

Absfml-This paper presents a new and quite simple for- This technique is considered to be valid from zero frequency
mulation to calculate the skin-effect resistance and internal up to very high frequencies.
inductance of a solid cylindrical conductor. The formulation This paper presents a new exact formulation for skin-effect
is obtained from the exact solution of the Maxwell’s wave
equation of an electrical field in the direction of propagation. resistance and internal inductance frequency-dependent. The
The Fourier transform method is used to obtain the frequency- use of this new formulation for any desired skin-effect analysis
domain solution, The mults are presented in graphical form is quite simple and gives the possibility to calculate the values
showing thc conductor resistance and internal inductance as a of the resistance and internal inductance from zero frequency
function of frequency. up to very high frequency. The formulation and the equivalent
Index Terms- Skin-effect, Resistance, Internal Inductance. circuit model are obtained from the solution of the exact
Maxwell’s wave equation of an electrical field exciting a solid
cylindrical conductor in the direction of propagation.
I. INTRODUCTION
11. THEBESSELFORMULATION
TECHN~QUE
S kin-effect loss has been extensively studied by many
researchers. However, most of them have dealt with the
high frequency skin-effect. Yen et d. [ l ] presented in their
The complex internal impedance of a solid cylindrical
conductor is obtained as the ratio of the voltage drop along the
work an equivalent circuit model consisting of M resistors surface to the total current enclosed (Matick [5] and Chipman
and M - 1 inductors derived from the skin-effect differential [ti]). The final solution is given by the following expression.
equation. But according to Kim and Neikirk [3], this technique
failed to accurately capture the skin-effect at high frequencies
and does not establish clear rules governing the choice of
component values. The last mentioned authors published an
article modifying the Yen et al. method using simple rules
for selecting the values of resistors and inductors, frequency-
independent, for a four deep ladder circuit model. A skin-effect
where,
equivalent circuit for a strip conductor is obtained by dividing
the cross section area into n elements along the x axis, and m
elements along the y axis where n and m must be very high
E21.
An exact formulation technique, known as Bessel formula- and R is the radius of the conductor, U is the conductor
tion technique and different from the above mentioned tech- conductivity and 1.1 = p o p r is the conductor permeability,
niques, is used to calculate skin-effect loss. This technique i s where p o is the permeability of free space and p o is the relative
presented in Matick [ 5 ] and Chipman [6]. In this technique the permeability.
skin-effect complex internal impedance of a solid cylindrical The real and the imaginary parts of the function Z(w)are
conductor excited by an alternating current is obtained as a given by
function of the ratio of the voltage drop along the surface of
the conductor to the current enclosed. The real part gives the
formulation of the resistive component, and the imaginary part
gives the formulation of the reactive component from which
the formulation of the internal inductance can be obtained.

Omar M. 0. Galous is with State University of Campinas-Sao Paulc-

Brazil and with Higher Institute of Medical Technology-Misurata -Libya (e-
mai Is omar@dsce.fee.unicamp.br and omarhimt Qyahoo.co.uk Tel:+55 - 19-
37883861 Fa~:+55- 19 - 37883860) Equation (3) represents the skin-effect conductor resistance
J . Pissolato Filho is with State University of Campinas- Sa0 Wulo-Brazil
{e-mail pisso@dsce.fee.unicap.br Teki-55 19 3788 - 3861 Fax:+55-
~ ~
and the skin-effect internal inductance can be obtained by
19-37883860) dividing (4)by w and it is given by

0-7803-8775-9/04/$20.00 02004 IEEE 919

 ~

mathematical formulation of the above mentioned equation as

a function of the electrical field z-component should be written
as follows

The functions ber(u),b e / ( u ) ,bei(zl) and bei’(u) are the

Bessel functions and they are given as summation expressions.
@E,(r, t )
ar2
+--r1 dE,(r,
ar
t)
r- -
1 b’Ez(r,
y2 at
t)
=o (9)
The ratio of the actual (effective) resistance or inductance where
to the DC values are given by the folIowing equations.

The solution of (9) should be obtained for the following

intervals

r E [O,R] ; t E [O,oo] (1 1)
The initial conditions are given by
111. THENEW FORMULATION
TECHNIQUE
0) = 0
EZ(r,
If the current-carrying conductors are imperfect and have
infinite conductivity there must be at least some small compo- The boundary conditions are given by
nent of an electrical field that forces the current to flow though
the conductor in the propagation direction. In this case, the EAR, t ) = E%) (13)
skin-effect complex internal impedance of the solid cylindrical where E:(t), is the a-component of the transient electrical
conductor is obtained directly from the complex internal field intensity on the conductor surface.
admittance which is obtained from the transient formulation The solution of (91, is given by Osmanis and Peterson [4]
of the sum of the current of the cross section of a cylindrical as
conductor. The transient formulation of the some of the current
is obtained, essentially, by solving Maxwell’s wave equation
of an electrical field exciting a solid cylindrical conductor in
the hection of propagation.
The transient excitation of cylindrical conductor geometry
following that the solution of Maxwell’s wave equation is
obtained as a current density distribution and also as a function
of time for the z component of a transient electrical field on where
the conductor surface, see Fig. (1)
x = -r
R
and .& is the kth mot of the Bessel function Jo(z) = 0.
Equation (14) gives the transient formulation of the sum of
the current of the cross section of a cylindrical conductor.

A. The transient formulation of the sum of the current

When the frequency is considered to be sufficiently low, the
current will stay uniformly distributed in the cross section area
Fig. 1. Solid cylindrical conductor geometry of the conductor, see Fig. ( 2 ) .

The function of the electrical field intensity is assumed R

to be symmetrical with respect to the z axis. Therefore, the

solution of the problem can be carried out from Maxwell’s
wave equation for the well conducting media as follows

where v is the conductor conductivity and p = popL,is the Fig. 2. Cross section area of a cytindrical conductor geometry
conductor permeability, where po is the permeability of free
space and pr is the relative permeability. The current through the element walls can be expressed as
To obtain the electrical field intensity at any point of
the transversal section of the solid cylindrical conductor, the

920
 ~

where r is the small radius, d r is the hckness of the consid-

ered element, and J,(T,t ) is the current density. According to (2k - 1)T p +

Ohm's law for a well conducting medium with specific con-
ductivity 0,the relation between the current density Jz(r,t )
and the electrical field &(T, t) can be expressed as
Integrating (16) over the conductor's cross section area of
radius R, and by taking into account the relations (15) and
(171, one obtain
<k =
2 4
Equations (23) and (241, give an interpretation of a cylin-
drical conductor's internal admittance. The series on the right
side of (23), evidently, may be considered as an extracted
equivalent circuit and can be represented by an infinite of
paralleI R L circuits, see Fig.0)

Finally, the substitution (14) into (18), gives the formulation

of the sum of the current through the cross section o f a L
cylindrical conductor of radius R as a function of an electrical
field exciting the conductor on the surface, and it is as follows
Fig 3. The extracted equivalent circuit for inlemal admittance of the cross
section area of a solid cylindrical conductor

where the kth circuit is defined by

For convenience i(t) can be expressed as

The specific skin-effect complex internal impedance can be
obtained by rearranging (22) as following
i(t) = I ' y ( t - T ) . E,R(T)dT 120)

In this equation (20) the function y ( t ) is obtained by

substituting the relation E," d ( t ) in (19) and the result will The function Z ( w ) , in (27), is the reciprocal of the function
be as Y ( w ) , given in (22), and it is defined in its real and imaginary
parts as follows

Z(w) = R ( w ) + jWLi,(W) (28)

In this equation (28) R(w) represents the resistive com-
B. The Complex Internal Impedance formulation ponent, which is the skin-effect conductor resistance, and w
The transient formulation of the sum of the current, (20), Li,(w) represents the reactive component, They are given by
can be used to obtain the exact formulation for the specific
skin-effect complex internal admittance. This can be achieved
by applying the Fourier transform method and the convolution
theorem and the result will be given by

where Y (U)is the fourier transform of the function y(t) given

in (21) and it is defined by

The skin-effect internal inductance L i n ( w ) is obtained by

dividing (30) by w and it is given as

where

The kth roots {k of the Bessel fUnction Jo(x) = 0 can be The modulus and the phase angle of the function Z(w) are
calculated by using the following simple expression defined by

92 1

and
e = tan-' (m)
@Li,(W)
(33)
The ratio of the actual (effective) resistance and the reactive
component as a function of frequency to the DC resistance
value and the ratio of the internal inductance as a function of
frequency to the DC intemal inductance value are usually of
great interest. The respective formulation can be obtained by
dividing (29) and (30) by Hdc and (31) by L k , which resulting
in
. -
A simple computer program was written in C language,
and the obtained results are presented in graphical form in the
following section.
Iv. RESULTSAND DISCUSSION
At the beginning one important point needs to be discussed
and analyzed. This point is dealing with the convergence
criteria of the infinite summations which in (29) to (31)
and in (34) to (36). The analysis shows that, for better and
more accurate results, the convergence criteria of these infinite
summations is achieved by selecting the suitable finite number
of k (number of terms of each summation). The analysis,
also, shows that the finite number of k, usually, depends on
the frequency, conductor radius and material used. Thus at
low frequency, for any conductor radius of any material, the
accurate results can be obtained by choosing a small infinite
number of k,but as the frequency increases the infinite number
of k must be increased. For any specific frequency and larger
conductor radius, accurate results can be obtained by choosing
larger infinite number of k.
One more point which needs to be discussed and analyzed
is that when the frequency is equal to zero and by using the
simple expression (25) for <k and, dso, by choosing suitable
finite number of k (23) will give the DC resistance value.
Also (29) and (31) will be reduced to those already known DC
expressions. But as the frequency increases R ( w ) will increase
922
4
linearly and Lin(w) will decrease linearly proportional to the
square root of the frequency.
Before presenting the graphical analysis, the obtained results
of the computational algorithm were tested for the verification
of the validity through its comparison with data obtained from
Literature. Fig. (4) shows comparison results for skin-effect
resistance, of solid cylindrical conductor of pure copper, at 20°
C with conductivity U = 5.88 x lO7nPim-l, and for some
different radii, obtained by the new technique and represented
by the solid lines, and those given in [5]obtained by the Bessel
technique and represented by the circles. From the figure it can
be observed that the results obtained by this paper are in good
agreement with the data obtained from literature.
10-1
100 102 10' 10s 10'
F - w w I+
Fig.4. Comparison resutts for a solid cylindrical conductors of pure copper
The following results investigate the skin-effect resistance,
internal inductance, impedance, phase angle and the normal-
ized impedance as a function of the frequency for a solid
cylindrical conductor of pure copper at 20°C with conductivity
= 5.88 x 107R-lm-'. Fig ( 5 ) shows the behavior of the
actual skin-effect resistance. As an example, for the conductor
radius R= 1.0 m the resistance starts from its DC value
(5.413 x 10-3Wm) and it is held constant at low frequency
range until the frequency gets, approximately, IO4 Hz. With
the increase of frequency the resistance increases linearly. The
figure shows that the smaller conductor radii are less affected
at relatively low frequencies.
The actual skin-effect internal inductance is shown in Fig.
(6). The figure shows that the internal inductance decreases as
the frequency increases. For any conductor radius, usually, the
internal inductance starts from its DC value which is 5 x lo+'
Wm.The figure also shows that the smaller conductor radii are
less affected at relatively low frequencies and as an example
for conductor radius R= 1.0 mm the internal inductance starts
to decrease from its DC value when the frequency reaches,
approximately, lo4 Hz.
The behavior of skin-effect impedance and phase angle are
shown in Figs. (7) and (8). The impedance, as a modulus,
increases with frequency and has quite similar profile as the
resistance. As an example, for a conductor radius R= 1.0 cm
the impedance gives, approximately, the same value as the
DC resistance. However, with the increase of frequency the
 t ......................... : ............................................... ...,., ............. ........ .....,.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ............ ....

10'

........................................ .............................
P3 1 0 "
..........................................................
3 13.l

j 10-2

1OJ
1 10 '
1
lo-+

10 *-
100 102 10' 108 1Do 10ID 10" 1od
100 1a* 10' 10'0 1O'z
Frequency [Hzl
Frequency iHzl

Fig. 5. Skin-effect resistance of a solid conductor of pure copper ai Z O O C Fig.7. Skin-effect impedance of a solid conductor of pure copper at 20°C

10 -
...............
1

........... .,...... ............................................

..... f.. , ...................... ,> . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

""" i
13 '

....................... ..,............:... ......... I... .. - - R=l.O" .." ......

..... R = I O D m m .......................................... .:..... ,,,,,,, a-rnn,",H
10- ' ' ' I
10" 10' io* 108 10' 10'0 10" .Y

Frequency lkl 1 O0 102 10' 10% 108 10'0 10'2

hequenr) w
Fig. 6. Skin-effect Inductance of a solid conductor of pure copper at 20°C Fig. 8 . Skin-effectphase angle of a solid conductor of purc cnpper at 20°C

impedance increases linearly. On the other hand, the phase the resistance. The normalized internal inductance component
angle, as shown in the figure, increases as the frequency decreases as the frequency increases.
increases. For the relatively low frequencies range its increas-
ing rate is quite high due to the influence of the resistive
I U'
component, while for medium and high frequencies ranges
its increasing rate is very low or may be constant due to the 10'

influence of the reactive component. At very high fresuencies 1'

0
the reactive component becomes very high and the phase angle
reachs a maximum value which is 0.785 radians or 45 degrees. in'
The figure, also, shows that the smaller conductor radii are less e
affected at relatively low frequencies. e
;lo'
Other important relations, usually of interest when studying
the skin-effect, are the ratio of the actual (effective) resistance
c
gio'
and the reactive components to the DC resistance value, and
in
also the ratio of the internal inductance to its DC value. The
obtained results for a conductor radius R = 1.0 mm are 104

shown in Fig. (9). The figure shows that both the normalized 10"
resistive and reactive components have increasing profile, with too 1o2 io' 1o6 100
Frequency IHz]
respect to frequency, and they becomes equal far medium and
high frequencies ranges. The normalized reactive component Fig. 9. Skin-effect impedance components of a solid conducior of pure
starts from a small value and increases up to infinity, while copper at 20%'
the normalized resistive component has the same profile as

923
 6

V. CONCLUSION the Higher Institute of Medical Technoiogy, Libya. His main

A new and quite simple for sbnLeffect corn- research interest is in transmission lines and electromagnetic
plex internal admittance formulation and its equivalent circuit compatibiBty*
model, for solid cylindrical conductor, have been developed.
The complex internal admittance formulation gives the possi-
bility to develop a new formulation for skin-effect resistance
and internaI inductance to be used for the calculation from
zero frequency and up to very high frequencies.
The advantage of this new formulation technique over
Bessels formulation technique (section II) is its simplicity and
quickness due to the use of the simple expression given by
(25) for the calculation of the kth roots of the Bessel function
( F k ) . Also there is need to consult the Bessel function tables
and it is very suitable for any computer language.
The developed extracted equivalent circuit model can be
used to simulate the skin-effect phenomena in any electrical
or electronic system
The transient formulation of the sum of the current (20
can be considered for various types of analysis of transient
problems. For example, the mathematical development of
the time-domain and the frequencydomain transmission line
models for skin-effect study.

REFERENCES
[ l ] C. S. Yen, 2. Fazarinc and R. L. Wheeler ’Time-Domain Skin-Effect
Model for Transient Analysis of Lossy Transmission Lines”, Procedings
of the IEEE, vol 70, pp. 750 - ?57, 1982.
[2] H.A. Wheeler, “Formulas for the Skin-Effect”, Proceding of the lnstitut
of Radio Engineers, vol. 30, pp. 412 - 424,1942.
[3] S. Kim and D. P. Neikirk. ”Compact Equivalent Circuit Model for
the Skin-Effect”. IEEE 1996 IEEE-M’IT-S Intemational Microwave
Symposium, editar: R. G. Ranson, vol. 3, San Francisco, California,
-
June 17 - 21, 1996,pp. 1815 1818.
[4] I. Osmanis & L. P. Peterson, ‘-me-Domain Skin-Effect Model for
Elwtromagnetical Radiating, Scattering and Transmission Problems”,
(USSR), Riga: Riga Polytechnical Institute, 8p2 - E5,pp.292 -
294,1990.
[5] Richard E. Matick, ’Transmisstion Lines for Digital and Communication
Network”, McGraw Hill Inc. New York, 1969.
[61 R0be1-1 A. Chipman, ‘Theory and Problems of ’Ikansmition Lines” ,
McGraw Hill Inc. New York, 1968.

VI. BIOFRAPH~ES
A. Jose Pissolato Filho
Was born in Campinas, Sa0 Paulo, Brazil, in 1951. He re-
ceived a PhD degree in electrical engineering from Universite
Paul Sabatier, France, 1986. Since 1979 he has been a staff
member in the Faculty of Electrical Engineering at Department
of Energy and Control of Campinas State University, Brazil.
His Main research interest is in high voltage engineering,
electromagnetic transients and electromagnetic compatibility.

B. Omar M. U. Gatous
Was born in Misrata, Libya, in 1959. He received a M.
Sc. degree in electrical engineering from Campinas State
University, Sa0 Paulo, Brazil, 1995. From 1983 up to 1989
he was been one of the engineers responsible for installation,
testing and operation of the electrical equipments for the
Power and Desalination Plant in Misrata, Libya. Since 1998
he has been a staff member of the electrical department at

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