CHARGING AND DISCHARGINg OF

Capacitor in r-c circuit.

NAME:G.SUNANDA
ROLL NO:39
Acknowledgement
• I owe a great many thanks to great many people who helped and
supported me during the making and writing of this project.
• My deepest thanks to my physics teacher, Mr. Manu John Yohannan the
guide of the project for guiding and correcting various documents of mine
with attention and care. He has taken pain to go through the project and
make necessary correction as and when needed.
• I express my thanks to Principal, Mr.bhaskar kumar, for extending his
support.
• I also express my gratitude to the physics lab-incharge, Mr. Anil, for his
support.
• I extend my heartfelt thanks to my family and well wishers .
 Index
1. Aim
2. Introduction
3. Material required
4. Working principle
5. Procedure
6. Circuit diagram
7. RESULT
8. USES
9. CONCLSION
10. Precautions
11. Bibliography
Aim:-
To show the charging and discharging of capacitor in r-c circuit.

Introduction:-
• An r-c circuit is a circuit containing a resistor and capacitor in series to a power
source. Such circuits find very important applications in various areas in science and
basic circuit which acts as building blocks of modern technological devices.
• It should be really helpful if we get comfortable with the technologies charging and
discharging of capacitors.

• 1.charging of capacitor:-
A capacitor is a passive two-terminal electrical component used to store energy in an
electric field. In the hydraulic analogy, charge carriers flowing through a wire are
analogous to water flowing through a pipe. capacitor is a rubber membrane sealed
inside a pipe. Water molecules cannot pass through the membrane, some water can
move by stretching the m The analogy clarifies a few aspects of capacitor.
• The flow of current alters the charge on a capacitor, just as the low of water changes
the position of the membrane. specifically, effect of an electric current is to increase
the charge of one plate of the capacitor, and decrease the charge of the other plate by
an equal amount. This just like how, when water low moves the rubber membrane,
increases the amount of water on one side of the membrane, and decreases the amount
of water on the other side.

• The more a capacitor is charged, the large it’s voltage drop; i.e., the more it pushes
back against the charging current. This is analogues to the fact that the more a
membrane is stretched the more it pushes back on the water.
• Current can low through a capacitor even through no individual even though no
individual electron can get from one side to the other. This is analogous to the fact
that water can flow through the pipe even though no water molecule can pass through
the rubber membrane. course, low cannot continue the same direction forever; the
capacitor will experience dielectric breakdown and analogously the membrane will
eventually break.
• The capacitance describes how much charge can be stored on one plate of a capacitor
for a given push(voltage drop).A very stretchy flexible membrane corresponds to a
higher capacitance than a stiff membrane.
• A charged up capacitor is storing potential energy, analogously to a stretched
membrane.

• Discharging of capacitor:-

• Using hydraulic analogy only we can understand that when the capacitor is charged
the membrane is stretched, but not if you allow the water to come out slowly, and let
 the membrane relax, then it is called discharging of capacitor. In other words, when
the charge on the each plates become zero. And the potential difference across it
terminals drop to zero.

• When a charged body comes into contact with a body which is not charged, the
electric charges jump from the charged body to the uncharged body till the charges on
both the bodies become equal. This process is called discharging.

• Discharging will begin once a circuit is connected between the terminals of the
capacitor. During discharge electrons on the negative plate will be forced off of the
plate by the repulsion of the other electrons on the plate. The positively charged plate
will attract electrons from the circuit toward itself.

• Discharging a capacitor comes down to connecting a resistive load to the capacitor’s

terminals. This creates a path for the current to drain through and allows the resistive
load to convert the electrical energy into thermal energy. Commonly used resistive
loads are a power resistor or a light bulb.

• If the plates of a charged capacitor are connected through a conducting wire, the
capacitor gets discharged. Again there is a flow of charge through the wires and hence
there is a current
Materials required
1. One Breadboard

2. 100F capacitor

• Capacitor, device for storing electrical energy, consisting of two conductors in close
proximity and insulated from each other. A simple example of such a storage device
is the parallel-plate capacitor.
3. Two 1MΩ resistors

• A resistor is an electrical component that limits or regulates the flow of electrical

current in an electronic circuit. Resistors can also be used to provide a specific voltage
for an active device such as a transistor.
4. One 9v battery

• A battery is a device that stores chemical energy and converts it to electrical energy.
The chemical reactions in a battery involve the flow of electrons from one material
(electrode) to another, through an external circuit. The flow of electrons provides an
electric current that can be used to do work.
5. Two Leds

• A Light Emitting Diode (LED) is a semiconductor device, which can emit light when
an electric current passes through it. To do this, holes from p-type semiconductors
recombine with electrons from n-type semiconductors to produce light.
6. on/off switches

• A switch is a device for making and breaking the connection in an electric circuit. It
enables/disables the flow of current to the device so that it can be used whenever
necessary. A switch can be used to turn on and turn off a device.

7.soldering iroN

• A soldering iron is a hand tool used in soldering. It supplies heat to melt solder so that
it can flow into the joint between two work pieces. A soldering iron is composed of a
heated metal tip and an insulated handle.
8.soldering paste

• Solder paste is used in the manufacture of printed circuit boards to connect surface
mount components to pads on the board. It is also possible to solder through-hole pin
in paste components by printing solder paste in and over the holes.
 9.Soldering wire

• Solder wires are wires with a low melting point which can melt along with the
soldering iron. .Solder wires are generally two different types – lead alloy solder wire
and lead-free solder.
10. Connecting wires

• Connecting wires allows an electrical current to travel from one point on a circuit to
another because electricity needs a medium through which it can move.

11. battery connector

• The connector is a device that joins electric circuits together.

Working principle
• An RC circuit is a circuit containing resistance and capacitance. As presented in
Capacitance, the capacitor is an electrical component that stores electric charge,
storing energy in an electric field. , the capacitor discharges through the resistor.

• A capacitor is a device that is used to store charges in an electrical circuit. A capacitor

works on the principle that the capacitance of a conductor increases appreciably when
an earthed conductor is brought near it. Hence, a capacitor has two plates separated by
a distance having equal and opposite charges.

• A resistor is a passive two-terminal electrical component that implements electrical

resistance as a circuit element. In electronic circuits, resistors are used to reduce
current flow, adjust signal levels, to divide voltages, bias active elements, and
terminate transmission lines, among other uses.

• A capacitor charges very rapidly without a resistor. If you remove the resistor, the
charge will flow into and out of your circuit as fast as possible. This means that it
takes less than one second for most capacitors to fully charge.

• Storing energy on the capacitor involves doing work to transport charge from one
plate of the capacitor to the other against the electrical forces. As the charge builds up
in the charging process, each successive element of charge dq requires more work to
force it onto the positive plate.

• Capacitors discharge when another path in the circuit that allows the charges to flow
to each other is created. This causes the charges to flow out of the capacitor, and the
capacitor becomes discharged after some time.

• Charging and discharging of capacitors follows an exponential law. Consider the

circuit which shows a capacitor connected to a dc source via a switch. Resistor
represents the leakage resistance of the capacitor, resistance of external leads and
connections and any deliberately introduced resistance.
Procedure
• Collect all components which are required. Capacitors, resistors, connecting wires,
battery with Connecting wire, soldering iron, soldering paste and wire, on/off
switches, breadboard.

• Draw the circuit diagram on breadboard according to the topic(charging and

discharging of capacitor in the rc circuit).

• Insert all components according to the circuit diagram on breadboard (front side of
breadboard)
• Connect all components with Connecting wires. According to the positive and
negative terminals(back side of cardboard).

• Working model of charging and discharging of capacitor in R-C circuit.

Circuit diagram
Result
Uses
• Charging and discharging of capacitors holds importance because it is ability to control as
well as predict the rate at which a capacitor charges and discharges that makes capacitors
useful in electronic timing circuits.
• Capacitor as a discharge unit:- capacitors used as charging unit abd the release of
charge (discharge energy) is used for triggering, ignition and in high scale as a power
source.
• By pass capacitor: The reactance of the capacitor decreases as frequency increases.
• A capacitor can be slowly charged to the necessary voltage and then discharged
quickly to provide the energy needed. It is even possible to charge several capacitors
to a certain voltage and then discharge them in such a way as to get more voltage (but
not more energy) out of the system than was put in.
• A capacitor is one of several kinds of devices used in the electric circuits of radios,
computers and other such equipment’s. Capacitors provide temporary storage of
energy in circuits and can be made to release it when required.
• RC circuits are frequent element in electronic devices. They also play an important
role in the transmission of electrical signals in nerve cells. A capacitor can store
energy and a resistor placed in series with it will control the rate at which it charges or
discharges.
• Resistor-capacitors, or RC filters, Electro cube’s RC Networks are designed to
prevent or substantially minimize the occurrence of arcing and noise generations in
relay and switch contacts.
CONCLSION
• Hence it is proved experimentally that 63% charge is there on capacitor after time
constant during charging and 63% charge is lost at the time constant during
discharging.
Precautions
• Do all the connections carefully.
• Do all the connections neat and tight.
• Do not connect led without resistance.
• Keep your self safe from high voltage.
• Before doing any experiment please consult to your subject teacher or lab assistant.
Bibliography
• Wikipedia.com
• Google search engine
• www. YouTube.com
• Physics NCERT book from class 12.