Thin Wire Representation in Finite Difference Time Domain Surge Simulation

Simulation of very fast surge phenomena in a three-dimensional structure requires a method based on Maxwell´s equations such as the finite difference time domain (FDTD) method or the method of moments (MoM), because circuit-equation-based methods cannot handle the phenomena. This paper presents a method of thin wire representation for the FDTD method that is suitable for the three-dimensional surge simulation. The thin wire representation is indispensable to simulate electromagnetic surges on wires or steel flames of which the radius is smaller than a discretized space step used in the FDTD simulation. Comparisons between calculated and laboratory-test results are presented to show the accuracy of the proposed thin wire representation, and the development of a general surge analysis program based on the FDTD method is also described in the present paper.