Application of Diodes as the Rectifiers

Electric energy is available in ac form

form. But most of electronic devices
require dc for their internal operation. We can use cells/battery to meet
this requirement. Sometimes we use battery eliminator that eliminates the
battery by converting ac in to required dc level. The eliminator is called
Power Supply. It has a step transformer followed by a diode circuit called
Rectifier.
Smoothing
AC Regulated
T
Transformer
f R tifi
Rectifier Circuit Regulator
Power (Filter)
dc
Source output
A
Half Wave Rectifier:
V
 Transformer is either step down.
 Diode is in series with transformer and load RL B
 Voltage induced across the secondary
 V= Vm sin wt, where Vm is the peak value of ac voltage
 During the +ve half of I/p voltage, diode becomes FB and
conducts resulting in iL current through RL load.
load This
makes 'A' positive w.r.t 'B'.
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Half-wave Rectifier (with ideal diode)
Half Wave Rectifier:
A
 During the +ve half of I/p voltage, diode
b
becomes FB and d conducts
d t resulting
lti iin iL V
current through RL load. This makes 'A'
positive w.r.t 'B'.
 Voltage drop across the diode is 0 0.7V
7V for Si B
diode. So, output voltage is approximately
same as that of I/p voltage vi.

 Whereas, during -ve half of vi, diode is RB

and is not conducting with practically no
current. So no voltage develops across the
RL.
 This voltage, across RL, though not perfect dc,
but is unidirectional.
 The dotted line indicates the average value of
the voltage over the complete one cycle.
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Half Wave Rectifier (with ideal diode)
 During the +ve half of the input voltage,
voltage the positive half of the voltage
will appear at the output as the diode will behave like a closed switch.

 Duringg the negative

g half of the input
p voltage
g ((T/2 to T),
), the diode will be
reverse biased and appear as open circuit and output voltage will be zero.

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Half Wave Rectifier (with practical diode)
 Adjacent figure shows input
waveform vi and output waveform vo.
 The output
Th t t signal
i l vo has
h a nett
positive area above the axis over full
period and we have to find the
average value
value.

Effect of using a silicon diode

with VK=0.7 V is noticed during
the forward-bias region of the
diode. Applied voltage must
exceed VK =0.70.7 V for the diode
to turn “on.”

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Half-wave Rectifier: Idc
Current iL through the load of half wave rectifier is given as :-
iL = Im sin ωt for 0 ≤ ωt ≤ л and Im is the peak value of current
iL
iL = 0 for л ≤ ωt ≤ 2л
P kC
Peak Currentt through
th h lload
d Im = Vm/ RL (assuming
( i didiode
d resistance
i t rd <<
RL)
dc or average value of current is given by the net area under the
curve over 0 to 2л cycle divided by the base (2л):
(2л):-

Area = iL d(ωt)

= Im sin ωt d(ωt) + 0 d(ωt)

л
= Im [-cos ωt]0 + 0
= Im [-cos л - ( -cos 0)]
= Im [1 +1] = 2.Im
Average value of the load current is = Iavg = Idc= area/base
= 2Im/2л
/2 = Im/л
/
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Half-wave Rectifier: Vdc
The dc voltage
g developedp across the load RL is
Vdc = Idc . RL = Im . RL
Л
Assumptions made for above derivation are:
 The diode resistance in forward bias is zero, and

 The secondary winding of the transformer has zero resistance.

 Second assumption is very nearly true, but the forward biased diode
resistance rd is sometimes not that small to be ignored as compared
to load resistance RL and as a result current gets modified to
Im = Vm / (RL + rd )
The dc voltage across the load is then written as
Vdc = Vm.RL = Vm ≈ Vm (if rd << RL)
Л(RL + rd ) Л (1 + RD / RL) Л
≈ 0 318 Vm
0.318.V

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Half Wave Rectifier – Vdc (with practical diode)
Effect of using a silicon diode with VK =0.7 V is
noticed during the forward-bias region of the
diode. Applied voltage must exceed VK =0.7 V
for the diode to turn “on.”
For v i < 0.7 V, the diode will be in open-circuit
state and vo= 0 V.
For v i > 0.7 V, diode will be conducting and the
difference between vo and vi is a fixed level of
VK=0.7V i.e. vo = vi – VK
Net effect is a reduction in area above the axis,
which reduces the resulting dc voltage level will
be: Vm  Vk
Vdc 

For situations where Vm >> VK, an
approximation
i ti can b be applied
li d b
by ignoring
i i VK to
t
calculate Vdc .
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Half-wave Rectifier: Peak Inverse Voltage

 During -ve half cycle of the input voltage, diode does not conduct. By
applying Kirchoff
Kirchoff'ss law, we can see that maximum voltage Vm appears
across the diode and this is the Peak Inverse Voltage.
• PIV = Vm
• PIV rating of a diode ≥ Vm

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Numerical Example:
(a) Show the output vo and determine its dc level for the network shown
below.
(b) What would be the output vo if ideal diode is replaced by a silicon
diode (c) Repeat parts (a) and (b) if Vm is increased to 200 V,
diode. V and
compare results using Eqs Vdc=0.318Vm and Vdc=0.318 (Vm-Vk).

((a)) The
Th diode,
di d iin the
th configuration
fi ti shown
h in
i the
th figure
fi above,
b will
ill conduct
d t
during the negative part of the input waveform. The output waveform vo
appearing across resistance R will be corresponding to the negative half of
the input waveform
waveform.

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Contd from previous slide...

Output vo is shown below. For

th time
the ti period i d T,
T the
th dc
d level
l l
is given as :
Vdc = -0.318Vm
= -0.318 (20 V)
= -6.36 V Negative sign
indicates that the polarity.
(b)For a silicon diode, the output is shown here
Vdc ≈ -0.318(Vm - 0.7 V) = -0.318(19.3 V) = 6.14 V
Resulting drop in dc level is 0.22 V, or about 3.5%.

(c) Vdc = -0.318 Vm = -0.318(200 V) = 63.6 V

Vdc = -0.318(Vm - VK) = -0.318 (200 V - 0.7 V)
= -(0.318)(199.3 V) = 63.38 V
Difference in 63.6
63 6 and 63.38 ignored Thus the offset and drop in
63 38 is small and can be ignored.
amplitude due to VK would not be discernible if the full pattern is displayed.
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Full Wave Rectifier

Center-Tap Rectifier Bridge Rectifier

(uses two diodes) (uses four diodes)

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
FWR with Center Tapped Transformer
A full-wave rectifier with two diodes uses a
center-tapped (CT) transformer (Fig-A) to
establish the input signal across each
section of the secondary of the transformer.
During the positive half of input voltage vi
applied to the transformer, induced voltage
across the two sections of the Secondary
winding will appear as shown Fig-B.
This makes diode D1 to be FB and D2 to Fig-A
be in RB state. As determined by the
secondary voltages, resulting current
direction and output voltage across load
resistor R are also shown below.

Fig-B
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky
Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 FWR with Center Tapped Transformer
During the negative portion of the input
input, the network appears as shown
below, reversing the roles of the diodes but maintaining the same polarity
for the voltage across the load resistor R.

The net effect of output voltage is same as that obtained for the full wave
bridge rectifier with the same dc levels
Vdc = 0.636 Vm (for ideal diode)
Vdc = 0.636 ( Vm – Vk ) (for Realistic diode)
If Vm >>Vk , then Vk can be ignored
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Full Wave Bridge Rectifier
Fig-A
Full-wave
Full wave rectifier uses four diodes in a bridge
configuration (Fig-A).
During the period t =0 to T/2, the polarity of
the
th iinputt voltage
lt is
i shown
h iin Fig-B.
Fi B
Polarities across the ideal diodes (Fig-C)
reveal that D2 and D3 are conducting, whereas
D1 and D4 are in the “off” state. Fi B
Fig-B

Net result during the positive half of input

voltage is given in Fig
Fig-D
D with current through
resistor R and voltage across R . Since the
diodes are ideal, the load voltage is vo = vi

Fig-C
Fig-D
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Contd...

D1

D4

For the negative region of the input (for t= T/2 to T), T) D1 and D4 are the
conducting diodes. This results in flow of current through R which has the
same direction as the current flowing during positive half of input voltage. In
addition, polarity of voltage across the load resistor remains unchanged.
Over one full cycle the input and output voltages will appear as shown
below.

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Contd...

Since the area above the axis for one full cycle is now
twice
t i that
th t obtained
bt i d ffor a half-wave
h lf system,
t the
th dc
d llevell ffor
full wave rectifier is given as:
Vdc = 2 times dc value of Half Wave Rectifier
= 2 X 0.318Vm = 0.636 Vm
Note: If silicon rather than ideal diodes are
employed in the rectifier(refer Fig below), the application
of Kirchhoff’s voltage law around the conduction path
results in
vo = vi – 2VK
Peak value of the output voltage vo is:
Vomax = Vm - 2VK
Vdc = 0.636 (Vm - 2VK)
If Vm >> 2VK , then Vdc =0.636 Vm
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Full-wave Rectifier: Output dc Voltage

 Output voltage wave forms and load voltage produced by center-tap

rectifier and Bridge rectifier are same.

 Only difference between the two types of rectifiers is the output of

secondary transformer voltage.

 Center-tap rectifier uses a transformer whose one half of the

secondary winding produces maximum voltage of Vm,

 while in Bridge Rectifier, Vm is the maximum voltage across the

entire secondary winding.

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Full-wave Rectifier: Output dc Current
 In half wave rectifier, only
y +ve half cycles
y are utilized to get
g dc output.
 In full wave rectifiers, both half cycles of ac supply produce dc supply.
 Therefore, dc or average current of a full wave rectifier is double of the dc
currentt output
t t off a half
h lf wave rectifier
tifi i.e.
i Idc = 2Im / л
Mathematically, Io = Im sin ωt for 0 ≤ ωt ≤ л (for +ve half cycle)
Io = -IIm sin ωt for л ≤ ωt ≤ 2л (for -ve
ve half cycle)
Idc = (1/2л) vo d(ωt)

= (1/2л)[ Vm sin ωt d(ωt) + (-Im sin ωt d(ωt) ]

л 2л
= (1/2л)[ [ - Im cos ωt]0 + [ Im cos ωt] л

= (Im/2л)
/2 ) [-
[ cos л + cos 0 + cos 2л
2 – cos л ]

= (Vm/2л) [1+1+1+1]

Idc = 2 Im / л
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Note: ω= 2лf
Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Full-wave Rectifier: Output dc Current Idc
Load current iL of a full wave rectifier is calculated below
below.
Note: For full wave, one complete cycle is from 0 to л

Load current iL = Im sin ωt for 0 ≤ ωt ≤ л

dc current Idc = (1/л) iL d(ωt)
= ( Im /л) sin ωt d(ωt)
= ( Im /л) |-cos ωt |0л

Idc =
2 Im
л

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 PIV of Diode for Center Tapped
T f
Transformer b
baseddR tifi
Rectifier
The network figure shown here helps
in determining the net PIV for each
diode used in a center-tapped
transformer based full-wave rectifier.
Sum of maximum secondary voltage
Vm and voltage VR developed across the
load resistor is the peak inverse voltage
across the diode that would be in
reverse biased diode:
PIV = Vsecondary + VR
= Vm + Vm andd
PIV = 2Vm

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Bridge Rectifier – Peak Inverse Voltage
 To define PIV for Bridge Rectifier, we must find the maximum voltage that
appears across the diode which is not conducting, when the secondary
voltage of the transformer attains its maximum value Vm.
 In Fig 2 below,
below D2 & D4 diodes are conducting and D1 & D3 are not
conducting when secondary voltage reaches its max value of Vm. The
conducting diodes have zero resistance (forward biased) and hence voltage
across them is almost zero,, consequently,
q y, point
p A and point
p B in the diagram
g
are at the same potential and so is the case for points C & D which are at the
same potential as diode D4 also has zero voltage drop across it. As a result,
entire secondary voltage Vm appears across the load RL and the same
voltage
lt also
l appears across th the nonconducting
d ti diodes
di d D1 & D3.
D3 Thus,
Th PIV =
Vm for a bridge rectifier.

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
PIV of Diodes for Full Wave Rectifier

PIV: The required PIV of each diode

(ideal) can be determined from the
adjacent figure is obtained at the peak
of the positive region of the input signal
signal.
For the indicated loop the maximum
voltage across R is Vm and the PIV
rating is defined by
PIV ≥ Vm

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Effectiveness of a Rectifier
How effective is a rectifier to convert ac in
to dc supply?
 A load resistance R connected across an
L
ac supply
pp y will show sinusoidal nature of
current through it.
 dc current has a certain amplitude as per

the load connected to the p power source,

and is continuous, has no fluctuations
and is unidirectional.
 To check the effectiveness of a rectifier,

we need too compare the rectified dc

current with ideal dc current.
 Current of half-wave rectifier is

unidirectional, but has fluctuations of

periodic nature.
 Current of a full wave rectifier also has

fluctuations with time, but is unidirectional.

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Effectiveness of a Rectifier
 Ripple: A unidirectional dc current that fluctuates with time has an average
or dc value, over which a number of ac (sinusoidal) components of different
frequencies are superimposed. These undesired ac components are Ripple.
 frequency
q y for half-wave rectifier = frequency
q y of input
p p power = 50 Hz.
 frequency for full-wave rectifier = frequency of input power = 100 Hz.
 Effectiveness of a rectifier in converting
g ac to dc is quantitatively
y
expressed in terms of Ripple Factor and Rectification Efficiency.
 Ripple factor is a measure of purity of dc output
rms value of the ac component of wave
r=
Average or dc value
 Rectification Efficiency indicates the percentage of total ac power
converted into useful dc output power
dc power delivered to load Pdc
ղ=
ղ =
ac input power from secondary of transformer Pac
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Performance of Half-wave Rectifier

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Performance of Half-wave Rectifier
Rectification Efficiency: For a half
half-wave
wave rectifier,
rectifier
the dc power delivered
to load is given as :

and the total ac

power is →

Therefore, the rectification

efficiency is

Where rd is the diode resistance and RL is load.

If rd<< RL, ղ → 40.6%. It means that under best conditions (I.e no diode
loss), only 40.6% of the input ac power is converted in to dc power. The
rest remains as ac power to the load.
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Performance of Full-wave Rectifier
Ripple Factor: For
F full-wave
f ll rectifier,
tifi ripple
i l factor
f t is i given
i as

Rectification Efficiency: For full-wave rectifier,

dc power delivered
to the load is
and the total input
ac power is

Therefore, the
rectification efficiency is

Rectification efficiency of a full-wave rectifier is twice that of a half-wave

rectifier under identical conditions
conditions. The maximum possible efficiency can be
81.2% (when rd << RL)
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
 Comparison between Rectifiers

Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Numerical Example:
(a) Determine the output
waveform for the network of in D1 D2
Fig-A and
(b) calculate the output dc level R
andd th
the required
i d PIV off each
h 1
diode.

FIG-A

For the positive region of the D1 D2

input
p voltage,
g , the network
appears as shown in FIG-B. R
1

Diode D1 is reverse biased and

Diode D2 is forward biased.
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e FIG-B
Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.
Contd...
For the negative part of the input voltage, the
roles of the diodes are interchanged
interchanged.
Redrawing the network results in the
configuration of FIG-C, where Rl
vo = (1/2) vi or
Vomax = (1/2).Vimax
= (1/2). (10 V) = 5 V,
FIG D shows
FIG-D h th
the waveform
f off the
th output
t t
voltage vo.
Impact of removing two diodes from the FIG-C
bridge configuration (4 diodes) is reduction of
available dc level to the following:
Vdc = 0.636(5 V) = 3.18 V - which is equal
to Vdc
d available from a half-wave
half wave rectifier with
the same input.
PIV for the diode is equal to the maximum
voltage
g across R1,, which is 5 V,, or half of PIV
for a half-wave rectifier with the same input. FIG D
FIG-D
Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory, 10/e Copyright ©2009 by Pearson Education, Inc.
Robert L. Boylestad and Louis Nashelsky Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458 • All rights reserved.