ELECTRONICS ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT

COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING
XAVIER UNIVERSITY- ATENEO DE CAGAYAN

Title of Experiment: BJT Familiarization and Characteristic Curves

Experiment #: 5

Names of Members: Date Performed:

Leo Marcelo P. Villalba September 1, 2015
Joeune B. Merencillo Date of Report Submitted:
Kent Louise M. Dorato September 8, 2015
James Roy O. Piquero
Primo B. Revilla III
Group Number: 3 Name of Intsructor:
Subject and Section: ECE 31- EC Engr. McAlvin Neri

Rating:
Introduction, Objective & Theory (20%) ______
Methods/Laboratory Performance (20%) ______
Data and Results (20%) ______
Discussions & Conclusions (20%) ______
Organization (20%) ______
Total (100%) ______

Remarks:
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
INTRODUCTION
A bipolar junction transistor (BJT) was invented by Schockley in 1951 to amplify radio
and TV signals. BJT replaced the vacuum tube which needed heater for its internal filament
requiring, watt power. A BJT is a three-terminal device, having the emitter, base, and collector. A
BJT is composed of NPN and PNP layers where it has 3 main operation, the cutoff, saturation, and
active. A transistor is like a diode being placed back to back or front to front. It also has a depletion
region like the diode because it is a semiconductor. Each layer of the transistor is unequally doped
in order for it to function according to its design. The emitter is heavily doped while the base and
the collector are lightly doped, both in PNP and NPN transistors. The basic operation of the
transistor is that the base emitter junction is forward biased while the base-collector junction is
reverse biased. The transistor current IE is approximately equal to IC due to the fact that the base
current IB is very small, in microamperes. Common use of transistors is a switch or an amplifier.
The objectives of the experiment are,
1. To familiarize BJT characteristics operated on Common Emitter configuration.
2. To plot and observe the data gathered in input characteristic of BJT.
3. To plot and observe the data gathered in output characteristic of BJT.
4. To plot a graph of 500 mW power dissipitation.
PROCEDURE
Starting with the experiment on the characteristics of the BJT transistors, the students had
gathered the following materials, Common Emitter Module, 2 Multimeters, Power supply, and
connectors. In the simulation we used 2N4061 PNP transistor and 2N4123 NPN transistor for
further data. The module diagram is presented on Figure 1.

Figure 1. Common Emitter Module.

 The first thing to be done is to plot and record data gathered in the input where the voltage
supply in the collector is fixed or no power is supplied in the collector. The input IB and VBE curve
is to be plotted where IB is in the vertical axis and the VBE is in the horizontal axis. There are
required IB input so that the base-emitter junction characteristic would be studied. The students set
the NPN/PNP selector to NPN and got the following data and for the PNP transistor and some of
NPN transistor, we simulated using NI Multisim.
Voltage is supplied in the base and getting the desired amount of current, the knobs were
turned. In our data, we can see that we started our IB at 0 µA up to 220 µA, with 20 µA interval
and getting 50 µA, see Tables 4 and 9 for the NPN and PNP input data. The corresponding VBE is
recorded and we can see that the behavior of the PN junction is really like the diode, see Figures
2 and 5. Its input characteristic curve is exponential such as that of a diode. Next in getting the
static resistance we solved using Eq.1 while for the dynamic resistance, we solved it using Eq.2
and comparing it with the theoretical value in which can be acquired using Eq. 3, the calculated
results are found on Tables 1 and 6.
VBE
R𝑖 = (Eq. 1)
IB
∆VBE
r𝑖 = (Eq. 2)
∆IB
26 mV
ri = (Eq. 3)
IB

For the output characteristic, the base current is held constant, IB = 50, 100 and 150 µA,
and the voltage supply for the collector is increased in definite increments in order to attain VCE
and record the corresponding IC which is equal to VC/100. The students increased the voltage from
0 V to 9 V and recorded the corresponding IC and this process being iterated three times in order
to get data from IB = 50, 100, and 150 µA. The following data is recorded in Tables 5 and 10. We
can see the output characteristic curve of the NPN and PNP transistor in Figures 3 and 6. Next, in
VCE = 5V and 8 V, we calculated for the static and dynamic resistances. In static resistance, we
used Eq. 4 and for dynamic, Eq. 5, see Tables 2 and 7.
VCE
R𝑜 = (Eq. 4)
IC
∆VCE
r𝑜 = (Eq. 5)
∆IC

After acquiring the data for the input and output resistance, we then moved to the
calculation of the βDC and βAC . We calculated this using Eq. 6 and 7, see Tables 3 and 8 for results.
We will notice that we used VCE = 5 V in obtaining our βDC and βAC where IB = 50 µA and IC is
the corresponding current in 5 V. On the other hand, in βAC , we used the data from IB = 50 µA and
150 µA.
I𝐶
βDC = (Eq. 6)
IB
I𝐶
βAC = | (Eq. 7)
IB 𝑉 = 5 𝑉
𝐶𝐸

Lastly, we made a 500 mW power dissipation curve and placed it in the output
characteristic graph. We can see from Figures 4 and 7 the power dissipation of NPN and PNP
transistor.
RESULTS/QUESTIONS

The following data are obtained from laboratory and simulation using NI Multisim 13.0.
Table 1. Input resistance of the NPN transistor.
Input Resistance
IB 50 uA 200 uA
Static 12060 Ω 3200 Ω
Dynamic (measured) 600 Ω 125 Ω
Dynamic (theoretical) 520 Ω 130 Ω

Table 2. Output resistance of the NPN transistor.

Output Resistance
IB 50 uA 100 uA 150 uA
5V 1101.32 Ω 533.05 Ω 356.89 Ω
Static
8V 1694.92 Ω 821.36 Ω 549.83 Ω
5V 16666.67 Ω 8333.33 Ω 5555.56 Ω
Dynamic
8V 16666.67 Ω 8333.33 Ω 5555.56 Ω

Table 3. Current gain of the NPN transistor.

Current Gain 𝛃𝐃𝐂 𝛃𝐀𝐂
Current Gain 93.4 94.7

Table 4. Input Characteristic Data of NPN transistor.

IB (µA) 0 20 40 50 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 200 220
VBE (mV) 0 578 569 603 608 615 621 626 630 634 637 640 642

Table 5. Output Characteristic Data of NPN transistor.

VCE (V) 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
50 0 4.31 4.37 4.42 4.48 4.54 4.60 4.66 4.72 4.78
IC (mA)
IB (uF)

100 0 8.90 9.02 9.14 9.26 9.38 9.50 9.62 9.74 9.86
150 0 13.29 13.47 13.65 13.83 14.01 14.19 14.37 14.55 14.73
 Input Characteristic Curve of NPN Transistor
250

200

150

IC (uA) 100

50

0
0 200 400 600 800
VBE (mV)

Figure 2. Input Characteristic Curve of the NPN Transistor.

Output Characteristic Curve of NPN Transistor

0.02

0.015
Ic (mA)

0.01 Ib = 50 uF
Ib = 100 uF
0.005
Ib = 150 uF
0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
VCE (V)

Figure 3. Output Characteristic Curve of the NPN Transistor.

500 mW Power Dissipation

0.12
0.1
0.08
IC (mA)

0.06
0.04
0.02
0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
VCE

Ib = 50 uF Ib = 100 uF Ib = 150 uF Power

Figure 4. Power Dissipation Curve of the NPN transistor.

 Table 6. Input resistance of the PNP transistor.
Input Resistance
IB 50 uA 200 uA
Static 12440 Ω 3300 Ω
Dynamic (measured) 550 Ω 150 Ω
Dynamic (theoretical) 520 Ω 130 Ω

Table 7. Output resistance of the PNP transistor.

Output Resistance
IB 50 uA 100 uA 150 uA
5V 592.21 Ω 307.39 Ω 212.01 Ω
Static
8V 893.86 Ω 463.98 Ω 320 Ω
5V 5917.2 Ω 3076.92 Ω 2105.26 Ω
Dynamic
8V 5917.2 Ω 3076.92 Ω 2127.66 Ω

Table 8. Current gain of the PNP transistor.

Current Gain 𝛃𝐃𝐂 𝛃𝐀𝐂
Current Gain 157.2 151.4

Table 9. Input Characteristic Data of PNP transistor.

IB (µA) 0 20 40 50 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 200 220
VBE (mV) 0 598 616 622 627 634 640 646 650 653 657 660 663

Table 10. Output Characteristic Data of PNP transistor.

VCE (V) 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
50 0 7.77 7.94 8.11 8.274 8.44 8.61 8.78 8.95 9.12
IC (mA)
IB (uF)

100 0 14.96 15.29 15.61 15.94 16.27 16.59 16.92 17.24 17.57
150 0 21.70 22.17 22.64 23.11 23.58 24.06 24.53 25 25.47
 Input Characteristic Curve of PNP Transistor
250

200

150

IC (uA)
100

50

0
0 200 400 600 800
VBE (mV)

Figure 5. Input Characteristic Curve of PNP Transistor.

Output Characteristic Curve of PNP

Transistor
0.03
0.025
0.02
Ic (mA)

0.015 Ib = 50 uF
0.01 Ib = 100 uF
0.005
Ib = 150 uF
0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
VCE (V)

Figure 6. Output Characteristic Curve of PNP Transistor.

500 mW Power Dissipation

0.15
IC (mA)

0.1

0.05

0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
VCE

Ib = 50 uF Ib = 100 uF Ib = 150 uF Power

Figure 7. Power Dissipation Curve of the PNP transistor.