Cablejoint and termination failures

are always a controversial issue.

The cable jointing kit manufacturer
is generally the first to be called to
account. In most cases the issue
ends up in accusations and
counter accusations involving the
cable jointing kit manufacturer, the
cable manufacturer, and the
installation contractor. All three
parties end up pointing the finger
at others. The end user who has
many different network items to
look after is often unable to devote
sufficient time and attention to go
into the matter in sufficient depth,
and sometimes may not have the
in-house knowledge to correctly
do a root-cause analysis to
determine the preventive steps.
As hok Saigal

Fit1J Failures of

MV Cable
Terminations:
A Study

52 11 September 2012 11 Electrical India

ost Cable manufacturers today do not have in-house

construction teams that have accumulated knowledge on the
practical usage of their cables and can analyze the field
conditions that could have led to the failures. The larger Contractors
mostly sub-contract the cable laying and jointing, and the smaller subcontractorsthey employ neither have neitherthe skill, nor organisational
strength, nor the inclination to go into technical issues. They are more
like labour providers for technical installations. Given the generally
acknowledged constraints of appropriately skilled workers in India,
they make-do with what is available.
Frontec has supplied many cable jointing kits which are in use in
different types of projects throughout the country. In some cases the
performance has been faultless. In some cases the failures have been
very high and heart- wrenching. In all reported cases of failures,
Frontec, as a responsible manufacturer, attempts to analyse, learn, and
improve frsmthese experiences.The action taken is not only limited to
-- - product improvement, but is targeted at enhancing the overall
customer satisfaction from a reliable electrical network, encompassing
the areas of cables, their installation and selection and installation of
accessories. This study aims to share some of the findings of cable
termination failures.

c
MV Cables

Failures due to poor materials

and design

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Failures due to poor materials and

designs are few, and mostly confined to low
priced and grey market kits. Unfortunately
these are-also sometimes counterfeit and
carry the names of better quality brands.
Some defects are easily apparent lon
visual examination before installation, or
after installation and before commissioning.
For example many components are
without adhesive coating at crucial parts. In
some cases the adhesive layer is too thin. In
others it is a hard and inflexible coating that
cracks on the slightest flexing. In such
instances the environmental seal against
moisture and water ingress is non-existent.
Entry of water into the higher electrical stress
tareas
o can result in.trackina over the cable
insulation or the stress control tubing.
In case of outdoor terminations the skirts
do not adhere to the tracking resistant
covering.They may slide out of position.~his
reduces the arcing diitance. In addition, the
creepage and arcing paths are no longer
over the surface of the skirt, but the currents
find a path between the neck of the skirt and
the track resistant tubing. This considerably
shortens the creepage 81flashover distances.
In case of rain these can particularly quick11
lead to termination failure.
The lack of adhesive seal at all external

have a common colour and texture. However

after a few years certain components,
specially breakouts and skirts, start showing
a lighter colour, a rougher surface and a
drastic reduction in mechanical strength. In
some cases it has to been found that a skirt
could be torn apart with bare hands as easily
as tearing a piece of chapati!

Failures due to poor cable

preparation
Failures caused by poor cable preparation
form the largest percentage of failures
observed by us. Fn small concentrated
installations like power stations the
concentrated location allows closl

interfaces can be visually checked before

installation. The quality of the adhesive
bonding can be equally easily detected by
trying to rotate an installed skirt. A good
adhesive should not allow the skirt to rotate,
while a poorly bonded one will turn with
little reistance.
In poorly designed low priced kits, thl
length of track resistant tubing is often
shortened to enable lower prices. As a result,
the length of tubing is not sufficient to cover
the individual cores from the breakout to the
lug. A length of bare XLPE insulation is left
exposed. This will crack under UV and allow
entry of water into the cable and termination.
Another cause of-failure observed in
some competitive products i s the poor
material quality of some of the heat shrink
components. Initially all components appear
to be made from the same material, and

Fig. 2: Insufficient length of track

resistant sleeve. Also note the scrape
marks on the sleeve

Electrical India I1 September 2012

k5

MV Cables

&

supervision and check on the quality of

jointing and the skill levels of the
jointers employed. In disbursed
locations like state distribution utilities
and rural electrification projects such
close monitoring is generally absent.
Jointers who lack the training and skill
levels are often allowed to do jointing
due to the non-availability of properly
trained jointers.
Removal of semi-con is a highly
skilled and often tedious technique.
This is specially true when the semi-con
is removed by scraping with a strip of
glass, as is the most common practice
in Distribution and Rural electrification
projects and maintenance. The
termination failures have been seen to
be caused by three common defects in
semicon removal.
First and most obvious in a visual
examination is the failure to smoothen
the insulation with Alox abrasive tape
after removal of semicon.This leaves air
gaps between the stress control tubing
and the cable insulation, which in turn

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. Rough surface of insulation after
scraping semicon with glass

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Fig. 4: Peaks left while removing semicon.

Also note the good adhesive bonding for
sealing against water ingress

4 I1 September 2012 11 ~lecticalIndia

causes high levels of partial discharge

that over time damage the cable
insulation. Secondly the semicon is not
removed in a level circle, but jagged
peaks and deep valleys are left. The
peaks become points for stress
concentration, again leading to high
partial discharges.
a
Thirdly, knife cuts and nicks are
often made in the cable insulation.
These cuts result in reduced insulation
thickness, and are specially critical and
common at the edge of the semicon.
This being the highest electrical stress
area of the termination, it results in very
early failure.

Failures due to wrong

installation of jointing kit
components
Of all causes that lead to pre-mature
failure of cable joints the most
in-excus~bleis the failure to read and
follow instructions provided in each kit.
Most installation instructions of
reputed manufacturers depict the
procedure in easy to understand
pictures along with the description. So
there is no reason that even a not well
educated person should not refer to
them. And it is not understandablewhy
Supervisors should not read them to
learn the procedure, and to check the
workmanship of the jointers. Yet in
many instances of failure it has been
easy to establish that components of
the kit were installed incorrectly.
One of the common and fatal errors
is to position the stress control tubing
incorrectly. In many cases it has been
installed over the metal tape screen,
down towards the cable jacket instead
of over the cable insulationtowards the
lug. Naturallythe stress control function
is completely lost. Furthermore, in case
of single core cables, the red tubing is
then installed with the stress control
tubing4rotruding out below the end
which has the sealant adhesive. This
leaves a clear entry path for water
between the uncoated stress control
sleeve and the cable screen.

Another common mistake, as

discussed earlier, is to leave the cable
core longerthan the length of red outer
sleeve provided. The lug seal is then
installed overlapping the lug barrel,
and a length of XLPE cable insulation is
left exposed to the environment.

Fig. 5: Stress control sleeve positioned

wronalv towards cable iacket

Failures due to improper

earthing of cable screens (at
screen, at pole)
MV XLPE Cables are screened for
many reasons. A major reason is to
confine the electrical field to within the
insulationand prevent voltages outside
of the screen. This is achieved by
earthing the metallic part of the
insulation screen. When the screen is
not earthed the electric field is not
confined t o within the screen.
Capacitive coupling occurs between
the cores and voltages are induced on
each and every insulating surface
between them and near them. These
would be on the surface of the cores
and the inner and outer sheaths. In the
case of 3 core cables there would be
potential differences between the cores
that would lead to discharges between
them. In simple terms, these discharges
are electrical sparks.
In practice the magnitude of these
sparks is considerable. Chattering is
often heard. In some instances,
particularly during humid and wet
weather visible sparking has been
observed at night on MVaerial bunched
cables.This sparking has been observed
to lead to damage to the core covering,
progress to the metallic screen, and
eventually to damage the insulation
itself. In early cases of detection of poor

earthing through the sound of

chattering it has been found that
proper earthing has eliminated the
problem.
Poor earthing of the screen arises at
two locations. First is the connection
between the metallic part of the cable
screen and the screen earth lead. Often
an earth braid is used. The convention
in India is to connect these braids to the
metal tape screen using binding wire &
recommend soldering. Unfortunately
soldering is most often not done by the
jointer. Further in many cases the
binding wire connection is also left
loose. A good quality electrical
connection is made more difficult when
the cables are provided with aluminium
screens and not copper ones. In all
cases there are two consequences. One
is that the screen can become free
floating electrically and develop the
induced voltages described above. The
second is that the loose connection
leads to localised sparking that
damages the insulation below the
connection and leads to a puncture
directly below the connection between
the earth braid and the metallic screen.
The problem is further aggravated
in case of fault conditions where high
levels of current pass through the
screen and the.high current combined
with the high contact resistance burns
a hole through the insulation.
Another source of poor earthing of
the screen occurs outside of the
termination. This is the connection
from the earth braid to the external
earth. In some instances the earth lead
is simply not connected to anything. In
many cases it is connected to the
commonly used 8 SWG GI earth wire by
simply threading the earth wire
through the eye of the thimble of the
earth lead. This leads to a limited line
contact, with high possibility of the
connection being intermittent. In other
instance an under sized binding wire of
1.5 or 2 sq mm is used to make the
connection between the earth lead of
4, 6 or 12 sq mm and the metal earth

cable terminations. The Jointers do

not have the requisite skill levels. While
installation of modern accessories has
been made very much easier compared
to the days of hot pouring compounds
and paper insulated cables that
required testing for moisture
absorption, the skill required to
prepare cables has not diminished.
Surgical precision and neat working
methods are still essential parts of a
Jointer's attributes. These have to be
developed through proper training,
and honed through practical
experience. While every erection
contractor or utility engineer cannot
be expected to have the resources to
carry out such training, they should
have the resources to check and
evaluate the skill level of the Jointer
before engaging or allowing him to do
an installation. If required they can
take help of the Jointing kit supplier to
carry out such evaluation and prequalification.
Implicit in this is the requirement
for the Supervisory staff (which
includes not just the Field Supervisors,
but also more senior Project Engineers)
to be themselves conversant with the
requirements of ensuring good quality
cable joints. Too often the lack of
knowledge of the subject by the
Supervising Engineers allows the work
to be passed at sub-standard levels.
Therefore the training of Engineers, in
a different manner and with different
content and style, is equally essential.
Investment in training and
qualification of jointers is a good value

Fig. 6: Loose connection of earth braid

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'ig. 7: Good connection of earth braid to

metal tape screen

Fig. 8: GI earth wire loosely looped

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strip. This often fuses out under high

currents, again leaving the earth
floating.

Role of training, evaluation

and Supervision
Irr many of the failures studied by
Frontec, it has been found that the
human factor has often been
neglected during the installation of

6 11 September 201 2 II Electrical India

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Fig. 9: On site field training of Jointers

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The very best

proposition, and i s strongly recommended as the easiest

way to avoid failures, and the most cost-effective way of
doing so.

...Snap-on mesh cable tray ever developed

Conclusion

by OBO engineers.
Lot of practical advantages make the
GR-MagicB more than just fast:

When a Joint or termination fails in the field, there is no

one willing to take ownership of i t s mortal remains. The
cablecompanies by and large do not consider the issue at
all involves them. The Electrical Consultant limits his
responsibility to a good set of specifications, and steers
clear of taking any stand on the merits of the particular
brand or manufacturer selected by his client on the basis of
a technical cut-off in line with the specification, and the
lowest bid criteria.TheContractorfeelsthat his responsibility
ends with the standard 18/24 month guarantee period. In
casea fewjointsorterminationsdofail during the guarantee
period, he will first blame the kit supplier, then the cable
quality, and if these excuses are not accepted, finds it
simpler to replace the failed product.The end user who has
the most to gain as he has to live with his network for the
next 30 to 40 years continues to give prime importance to
the up-front cost of the kits, and feels comfortable that he
has passed on the responsibility to the Contractor or kit
supplier through the guarantee clauses.
In this scenario it is the more responsible cable jointing
kit manufacturers who try to protect their reputation by
providing cable jointing services, training in cable jointing,
evaluation of Jointer skills, and field services to analyse field
failures, and thereby minimise future complaints and
customer dissatisfaction.
All too often this value addition is not appreciated by
the various segments that benefit from it. More importantly
the lessons that could be learnt from it are not learnt and
their significance under-estimated and the opportunities to
eliminate the possible causes of future failure are lost.
These subjective criteria need to be given due importance
along with the bare price quote in choosing not only Cable
Jointing kit suppliers, but any product or service supplier, to
partner or associate with for any project.

1 Ashok Saigal is an Electrical Engineer from IIT Kharagpur,

Available In Electro Galvanized, Hot Dip Galvanized & Stainless Steel

and an MBA from a leading US Ufli~ersity. He is ths

co-founder and Managing Director of Frontier Technologies,
a small and specialised manufacturer of heat shrink
products and cable jointing k i . In the past he has alsD
been associated with L&T Raychem, and Sicame. He has
been associated with Cables and accessories for over 30
years. He has played an important role in the introduction
of several new concepts in lndii, including the introduction
of !$at shrink technology, Low Fire hazard cables, and
ma& recently Aerial Bunched cables. He has served on
several Sub-committees of the Bureau of Indian Standards
related to Cable Jointing kits, and helped many Utilities in
developments of their Standards and Practices related to
--tab
IjBS.