RC Series

Resonance
Circuit
Student study
project
 CERTIFICATE
This is to certify that the report entitled “ RC Series
Resonance Circuit ” submitted to the department
of physics, Government degree college, Malkajgiri
is a record of bonafied research work carried out by
Mr. P.Sravan Kumar ,Mr. Ch.Kishore Reddy , Mr.
K.Yashwanth ,Mr. J.Jairam ,Mr. B.karthik ,Mr.
D.Santosh , at department of physics, Government
degree college , Malkajgiri under my guidance.
The results embodied in this report have not been
submitted to any other institution or university

Mr. V.Veera Reddy,

Assistant professor,
Department of physics,
Government degree college,
Malkajgiri.
 ACKNOLEDGMENT
We express our deep sense of gratitude and
sincere thanks to Sir V. Veera Reddy , assistant
professor of physics, Government degree college ,
Malkajgiri for his keen interest, constant
supervision and suggestions during our project
work.
We are grateful to the physics laboratory,
Government degree college, Malkajgiri for
providing equipment and laboratory facility for
experiments for this project.
Hall Ticket No
209021468037 P.Sravan Kumar
(MPCs)
209021468009 Ch.Kishore Reddy
(MPCs)
209021468027 K.Yashwanth
(MPCs)
209021443001 J.Jairam (MPCs)

209021468007 B.Karthik (MPCs)

209021468011 D.Santosh (MPCs)

 CONTENTS
SNo Chapter Page no

1 Purpose 5

2 Introduction 6

3 Construction Materials 8

4 Theory 12

5 Construction Procedure 17

6 Observation 18

7 Graph 19
8 Calculation 21

9 Conclusion 22

10 Resources 22
 Purpose
The goal of this project is to verify that 63% charge is
stored in a capacitor in an RC circuit at its time constant
and 63% charge remains when capacitor is discharged
and hence plot a graph between voltage and time.
 Introduction
An RC circuit is a circuit containing a resistor and a
capacitor in series to a power source. Such circuits find
very important applications in various aeras of science
and in basic circuits which acts as building blocks of
modern technological devices.
Lets first know about charging and discharging of
capacitors
Capacitor : A capacitor is a passive two-terminal
electrical component used to store energy in an
electricfield.
Charging and discharging of capacitor :
The 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, It is
called as charging of capacitor.
The more a capacitor is charged, the larger its voltage
drop ; i.e. the more capacitor is charged, the more it
pushes back against the charging current.
Current can flow through a capacitor even though no
individual electron can get from one side to the other.
The current flow cannot continue in the same direction
so after some time the capacitor will experience
dielectric breakdown .
The capacitance describes how much charge can be
stored on one plate of a capacitor before a voltage
drop.
A charged capacitor is storing potential energy.
When the charge on each of the plates becomes zero
and the potential difference across its terminals drops
to zero then it is called discharging of capacitor.
 Construction
Materials
1. Breadboard

2. 100µF capacitor
3. 1 MΩ resistor

4. Multimeter
5. 9V battery and Battery connector

6. Connecting wires
7. Wire stripper
8. Stopwatch
 Theory
When a capacitor of capacitance C is connected in
series with a resistor of resistance R and then
connected to a battery of EMF E , it gets charged but
due to resistance introduced it takes time and hence
the potential difference between plates of capacitor
varies as an expotential function of time

𝑥𝑡
𝑉=ⅇ

The circuit diagram of RC circuit used for this project is

By applying Kirchhoff’s law on above circuit during

charging i.e. figure b
𝐸 − 𝑉𝑐 − 𝐼𝑅 = 0 …(1)
 𝑄
 𝑉𝑐 =
𝐶
From eq 1
𝑄
𝐸 − − 𝐼𝑅 = 0
𝐶

ⅆ𝑄
Since 𝐼 =
ⅆ𝑡
𝑄 ⅆ𝑄
 𝐸− − 𝑅=0
𝐶 ⅆ𝑡
𝑄 ⅆ𝑄
𝐸− = 𝑅
𝐶 ⅆ𝑡
ⅆ𝑄
 𝐸𝐶 − 𝑄 = 𝑅𝐶
ⅆ𝑡
Integrate on both sides
𝑡 𝑄
1 1
∫ ⅆ𝑡 = ∫ ⅆ𝑄
𝑅𝐶 𝐸𝐶−𝑄
0 0

𝐸𝐶−𝑄 𝑡
 − 𝑙𝑛 = …(2)
𝐸𝐶 𝑅𝐶
 −𝑡
𝑄
1− =ⅇ 𝑅𝐶
𝐸𝐶
Hence we get

−𝑡
𝑄 = 𝐸𝐶 (1 − ⅇ 𝑅𝐶 )

Since 𝐸𝐶 = 𝑄𝑜 for capacitor

−𝑡
𝑄 = 𝑄𝑜 (1 − ⅇ ) 𝑅𝐶 …(3)

Where
Q --→ charge at time t
𝑄𝑜 --→ maximum charge capacitor can hold

since
Q=CV and 𝑄𝑜 = 𝐶𝑉𝑜
Where
V --→ voltage at time t
𝑉𝑜 --→ maximum voltage
Therefore from eq 3
 −𝑡
𝐶𝑉 = 𝐶𝑉𝑜 (1 − ̅̅̅̅ )
𝑅𝐶
ⅇ

−𝑡
𝑉 = 𝑉𝑜 (1 − ⅇ ) 𝑅𝐶

This equation is for charging similarly for discharging

we get

−𝑡
𝑉= 𝑉𝑜 (ⅇ 𝑅𝐶 )

When RC=t then we get

𝑉 = 𝑉𝑜 (1 − ⅇ −1 )
𝑉 = 0 ⋅ 63𝑉𝑜
The voltage on capacitor at time t=RC becomes 63%
of the maximum voltage, which means 63% of total
charge has been stored in the capacitor.
This product of R and C is known as time constant and

it is denoted by  , which means for any capacitor in

RC circuit 63% of total charge is at time constant.
In this experiment we used a 100µF capacitor and 1
MΩ resistor thus ,
Time constant = 100 × 10-6 × 106 = 100 sec
 Construction
Procedure
• Connect all the components in breadboard as
shown in the figure below

• Now take Multimeter leads and place them in two

terminals
• Now take the battery and its terminal across the
terminal of the capacitor and start the stop watch.
• Note the readings at 20 second intervals
• Take 10 readings and if required the 20 sec gap can
be increased because as the time passes by the
change in voltage becomes smaller and smaller.
• Now let the capacitor be charged up to 460
seconds because then it will become 99.99%
charged.
• Now remove the battery and attach a wire in place
of the battery terminals and again note the
Multimeter readings changing and record them.
• Plot a graph between voltage and time for
charging as well as discharging.

Observation
S.No Multimeter Multimeter Time (in
reading reading while sec)
while discharging(in
charging(in V)
V)
1 0 8.95 0
2 1.65 7.34 20
3 3.02 6.00 40
4 4.11 4.91 60
5 4.90 4.03 80
6 5.69 3.30 100
7 6.72 2.21 140
8 7.00 1.54 180
9 8.12 0.74 250
10 8.40 0.43 300
 Graph
Graph plotted voltage vs time with time on x axis and
voltage on y axis

1) for charging
2) for discharging

3) both in one graph

 Calculation
Now since the graphs are similar to the graph of
charging and discharging of capacitor.
At  = 100s , during charging of capacitor the voltage on
capacitor is 5.69 volts as it is observed in the
experiment.
Now using the charging formula
𝑡
−𝑡
𝑉 = 9 (1 − ⅇ )
1
𝑉 = 9 (1 − )
ⅇ
V=5.675.69
Which we got experimentally as well
Similarly during discharging
𝑉 = 9𝑥ⅇ −1
V=3.323.30
 Conclusion
Hence it is verified experimentally that 63% charge is
on capacitor after time constant during charging and
63% charge is lost at time constant during discharging

Resources
• Bsc text book
• H.C verma
• Google.com