EGR220 Than & Bhavin Lab #3

Introduction and Objectives Figure 1

First, we checked the secondary voltage of the
One of the most applications of diodes are rectifier transformer, and we found that Vpp is 20V, and the
circuits, which converts AC to DC. In fact, diodes average voltage is 12.7V and the current is about 1
rectifier forms the fundamental building block of the mA. We, then, estimated the max current and peak
DC power supplies for electronic devices [1]. inverse voltage across the diode. PIV (Peak Inverse
Therefore, in this lab, we were instructed to measure Voltage) was actually the peak value of the secondary
and analyze behavior of rectifier circuits, both half- voltage of the transformer, which is 10V. The
wave and full wave (bridge) rectifier and peak rectifier. maximum current was calculated from V0/R which
The primary objectives of this lab are: was 9.3 mA, where V0 ≈ Vp – VD and VD = 0.7 V (We
assumed that rD << RL)
1. To analyze and understand the nature of half-
wave rectifier In the prelab, we calculated the average voltage
2. To understand about the nature of bridge of V0 by using the following formula:
rectifier and peak rectifier
3. To be able to approximate ripple voltage by Avg V0 = (1/π)Vp – VD / 2 (1)
using ideal diode model
4. To be able to understand the effect of where VD = 0.7 V (Ideal Model). We got 2.83V
capacitance on peak rectifier circuits for average V0. Average power can be calculated
by
Equipments and Components used Avg P = (Avg V0 )2 / RL (2)
In this lab, the equipments and components we used
are:- Power Diodes: 1N4004 (x5); Transformer Therefore, average power dissipated by RL was
[12.6V, 1A]; Resistors: 1KΩ @ 1W (x1), 2KΩ @ 8.03 mW.
1W (x1), 100Ω @ 3W, 200Ω@ 2W (x1), 510Ω@ 1W
(x1); Capacitor: 470μF @ 50V (x5) a breadboard, a With Oscilloscope, we captured the screen image
waveform generator, ±20V power supply, a multi- of both Vs (Secondary Voltage of Tranformer)
meter, an Oscilloscope to capture the I-V curve, wires and V0.
and cords.

Procedures
Procedure 1: Analyzing the Nature of of Half-

Figure 2: 2 Waveforms of Vs (10Vpp) and Vo (1KΏ)

From the screen image, we found that there was an

Wave Rectifier Circuits offset between output voltage and Vs. By moving
cursor, we measured the gap between two wave forms,
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EGR220 Than & Bhavin Lab #3

and found that it was almost 0.7V. Then we measure

the average output voltage with multimeter, and found We built the circuit as in figure 4, and captured the
that the average output voltage 2.78V. When compared screen image of output voltage and source voltage.
to the calculated value, which was 2.83V, we found
that there was error of 0.05, which might be the result
of cumulative errors built up from approximation used
in ideal model.

Then, we doubled RL analyze the effect of load

resistance on the circuit. From our prediction from
prelab, we assumed that the increment on load
resistance would not affect the output voltage, as long
as diode resistance is far much smaller than load
resistance.

We captured the screen image, and then analyzed and Figure 5: 2 Waveforms of Vs (10Vpp) and Vo (1KΏ
compared the result with our prediction. We found that and 470 uF)
the amount of change in output voltage was negligible.
In the prelab, we calculated the ripple voltage Vr by
using the following formula:

Vr = Vp / fCR (3)

We got Vr = 0.35V. The output voltage was calculated

from

Avg V0 = Vp – 0.5Vr (4)

We got avg V0 = 9.82 V. We measured both output

voltage and ripple voltage by using multimeter, we
Figure 3: 2 Waveforms of Vs (10Vpp) and Vo (2KΏ) found that avg V0 = 9.77V and Avg Vr = 0.19V, and
that the measurement results were not very far from
the prelab calculation.
Procedure 2: Analyzing the Nature of of Half-
Wave Peak Rectifier Circuits Then, we replaced RL with 100Ώ, 200Ώ and 510Ώ to
analyze the effect of load resistance on the circuit.
Since load current IL is V0 /RL, when frequency and
capacitance is kept constant at 470 uF, Vr is directly
proportional to load current (Assume Vp ≈ V0).

Vr = IL / fC (5)

In prelab, we calculated the value of IL and Vr and

plotted the data on the I-V graph.

Figure 4

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EGR220 Than & Bhavin Lab #3

4 4
3.5
3.5
3
3 2.5

Ripple Voltage
2.5 2
Ripple Voltage

1.5
2
1
1.5 0.5
1 0
200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 1600 1800 2000
0.5 Capacitance (uF)

0 Figure 7: Ripple Voltage Vs. Capacitance

0.01 0.02 0.03 0.04 0.05 0.06 0.07 0.08 0.09 0.1 0.11
Current
2
Figure 5: Ripple Voltage Vs. Load Current
1.8
1.6
2
1.4
1.8
1.2
Ripple Voltage

1.6
1
1.4 0.8
1.2 0.6
0.4
Ripple Voltage

1
0.8 0.2
0
0.6
200 400 600 800 10001200 1400160018002000
0.4 Capacitance (uF)

0.2
0 Figure 8: Measured Ripple Voltage Vs. Capacitance
0.01 0.01 0.02 0.02 0.03 0.03 0.04 0.04 0.05 0.05
Current
Although ripple voltage we measured was average
value, the graph showed the inverse proportionality.
Figure 6: Measured Ripple Voltage Vs. Load Current
Procedure 3: Analyzing the Nature of of Full-
We also plotted the measure load current and average Wave Bridge Peak Rectifier Circuits
ripple voltage with multimeter, and the curve showed
that it is pretty much linear.

Again, we kept constant for load resistance at 100Ώ,

and changed the capacitance, and analyzed the ripple
voltage. We predicted that the ripple voltage would be
inversely proportional to the capacitance.

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EGR220 Than & Bhavin Lab #3

The non-linearity nature of diodes are very useful

in building rectifier circuits. Although we used the
ideal model of diode for Half-Wave Peak rectifier
and Full-Wave Peak rectifier, we found that the
approximations were pretty close to observations
as the supply voltage was far much greater
compared to the voltage of diode. However, if the
Figure 8 supply voltage is much close to that of diode, the
In bridge configuration, neither side of terminal of ideal model of diode will not work and we need to
the transformer is grounded so that during each use more elaborate model such as constant voltage
half-cyle (positive or negative), the current flows drop or piece-wise linear.
from D1 through RL to D2 or from D4 through
RL to D3.
References
[1] Sedra, Adel S., and Smith. Kenneth C. “Microelectronics
Circuits”. 5th. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004.

Figure 9: Ripple Voltage of Bridge Peak Rectifier

We built the circuit as in figure 8, and captured the

screen image of average output voltage and
figured out the ripple voltage.

In the prelab, we calculated the ripple voltage Vr by

using the following formula:

Vr = Vp / 2fCR (6)

V0 = Vp – 0.5Vr (4)

We got Vr = 0.175V, and V0 = 9.9V. From our

measurement, we got Vr = 0.17V, and V0 = 10V. When
compared the ripple voltage of bridge rectifier with
that of half-wave rectifier, we found that bridge's ripple
voltage was half of the half-wave's ripple voltage.

Discussion
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