Homework 24.

Discharging capacitors

1 A charged capacitor is connected across a 200 kΩ resistor as shown in Figure 1. The p.d. across
the resistor is recorded for 5 minutes, starting when the resistor and capacitor are connected.

Figure 1
a Complete Table 1. [2]

t/s 0 30 60 90 120 150 180 210 240 270 300

V/V 6.00 4.44 3.29 2.44 1.81 1.34 0.99 0.73 0.54 0.40 0.30

I / µA

Table 1

Using your values from Table 1, plot a current–time graph on the axes provided in Figure 2. [3]

Figure 2

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 b Use your graph to calculate the charge that has flowed through the resistor in the five minutes
and to calculate the capacitance of the capacitor, assuming that very little charge remains in the
capacitor. [3]

c The experiment is repeated with the 200 kΩ resistor replaced with a 400 kΩ resistor. On your
graph in Figure 2, sketch the results that would be obtained. Explain why this graph is different
from your first one. [4]

2 Early particle accelerators needed very large capacitors to counteract the effect of changing
currents in big electromagnets. After each use, the capacitors needed to be discharged.

a Calculate the charge stored in a 100 F capacitor charged by 1000 V. [1]

b Explain why discharging this capacitor through either a very low value or a very high value of
resistance would not be sensible. [4]

c The solution found was to obtain the capacitance needed by putting many capacitors in
parallel. Before discharge, a switch was used to reconnect all the capacitors in series. This is
illustrated in Figure 3 using three capacitors – in the particle accelerator, there were many
more.

Figure 3

Use this example of three identical capacitors to explain how this switching changes the
combined capacitance, the p.d. across the combination and the charge that needed to flow
through the external resistance. [3]

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