Electronic – Why does a delta/wye transformer make 30 degrees phase shift

deltaphase shiftpower-engineeringthree phasetransformer

I'v heard that a delta/delta or Wye/Wye transformers do not make any phase shift. In delta/wye or wye/delta transformers, There is a 30 degrees phase shift between the primary and secondary coils. So, Why is there a phase shift ? and Why is it 30 degrees ?.. Why not 60 or 120 ?

I googled and I found calculations with phasor diagrams that proves the 30 degrees phase but I'm confused because of too many calculations and diagrams, I didn't get it.

Would you give me a simple answer, please ? and I prefer the physical meanings and concepts rather than equations and mathematics.

Thank you very much,

Best Answer

Let's call the 3 phases A, B and C and let's say we notionally have a neutral wire. Neutral is basically 0V in the system.

The "A" phase voltage (to neutral) is my chosen reference that all other voltage phase angles are measured from hence, V\$_B\$ is 120 lagging V\$_A\$ and V\$_C\$ is 120 degrees leading V\$_A\$.

OK so far?

What about the voltage between line A and line B (aka V\$_{AB}\$) - this is called line voltage (not to be mistaken with voltages between phase and neutral). Line voltages are \$\sqrt3\$ times bigger than phase voltages.

OK so far?

If you are not just examine what happens here: -

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If you use trigonometry and resolve all the triangles you can find the length of V\$_{AB}\$ - it is \$\sqrt3\$ times bigger than either A or B to neutral.

It's also 30 degrees leading A and this is where the 30 degrees comes from.

So, a delta primary will receive primary line voltages of V\$_{AB}\$. V\$_{BC}\$ and V\$_{CA}\$.

Given that a transformer doesn't inherently phase shift anything (other than the trivial cases of 0 degrees and 180 degrees), any secondary winding voltage must be in phase with their respective primary voltage no-matter whether the secondary is connected delta or wye.

OK so far?

Then you have it because, a delta primary works with line voltages and these are 30 degrees shifted to their nearest phase voltage. The secondary outputs are also 30 degrees shifted and hence a wye secondary will produce a phase voltage that is 30 degrees shifted from the equivalent (but not directly connected to) phase voltage on the primary.

It's trivial to do the wye-delta transformer so I'll leave it to someone else.