Passive Filters

-What did the capacitor say to the resistor after the party? "I'm
feeling a little passive-aggressive after all that AC.”-
Introduction

● An electronic filter is used to remove unwanted frequency components from

a signal.
● A network designed to attenuate certain frequencies but pass others
without attenuation is called a filter.
● Electronic filters sort through a signal, emphasizing desired frequencies and
weakening or eliminating unwanted ones.
● A filter contains least one pass band and a stop band (attenuation band)
along with suitable cutoff frequencies.
Introduction

● Pass Band - A band of frequencies in

which the output is approximately
equal to the input (attenuation is zero).
● Stop Band (Attenuation Band) - A band
in which output is zero (attenuation is
infinite).
● Cutoff Frequency - The frequency that
separate the pass band and the stop
band (attenuation band).
Why are Filters Used?

● A transducer often does not measure the physical parameter (measurand)

precisely.
○ Signal originating from a transducer is fed to the signal conditioner which reproduces the
original signal.
● The information present is not in standard form, which requires filtering and
analysis.
● Remove any false or unwanted signals which may get introduced into the
system, either at the transduction stage or at the signal conditioning stage.
Types of Filters

● Analogue Passive filters

○ Use passive components such as resistors, capacitors, and inductors.
○ Examples - Low-pass, High-pass, Band-pass, Band-stop
● Analogue Active filters
○ Use active components such as operational amplifiers and transistors alongside passive
components.
○ Examples - Low-pass, High-pass, Band-pass, Band-stop
● Digital filters
○ Used to postprocess acquired signals and can be used in conjunction with sophisticated
digital signal-processing techniques such as Fast Fourier Transform to perform spectral
analysis of acquired signals.
○ Example FIR, IIR
Types of Passive Analogue Filters
Ideal Filter Response Curves

Low Pass Filter (LPF) High Pass Filter (HPF) Band Pass Filter (BPF)

Band Stop Filter (BSF) All Pass Filter (APF)

Low Pass Filter (LPF)

● The low pass filter lets all the low

frequencies below a certain cutoff
frequency to pass through and blocks all
the high frequencies.
● The area where the signals can pass
through is known as the pass band, and
the areas where the signal is blocked is
called the stop band or the attenuation
band.
 RC Low Pass Filter

● Impedance of the Capacitor decreases with

increase in frequency.
● At low frequencies, the capacitive reactance First order Low Pass Filter Circuit
is very high, and the capacitor circuit can be
considered as open circuit.
● At very high frequencies, the capacitive
reactance is very low, and the output voltage
is small as compared with the input voltage.

Source - https://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/filter/filter_3.html
RC Low Pass Filter

Reactance of a Capacitor Output voltage

Cutoff Frequency Gain

RC Low Pass Filter

● Frequency Response

Phase Response

Magnitude Response
RC Low Pass Filter

● One of the major downsides of the first order low pass filter response is the
decrease in attenuation after the cutoff frequency.
● To achieve sharper filtering, multiple resistor-capacitor circuits can be
cascaded, effectively increasing the filter order.
RC Low Pass Filter

● Every additional capacitor-resistor pair, the order of the filter increases.

● Each increase in order increases the slope of the attenuation.
RC Low Pass Filter

● Output impedance of one stage, influences in input impedance of the

corresponding stage.
● The input impedance of the corresponding stage is kept at least 10 times
greater than the output impedance of the previous stage.
● To accommodate the increase in impedance, the resistance of each stage
should increase by 10 times, and the capacitance should be 10th of the
previous stage.

This arrangement poses a crucial problem in real world!

 RL Low Pass Filter

● Inductor provides low reactance for low-frequency signal & high reactance
for a high-frequency signal.
● When the input signal frequency is low, inductor reactance will be lower than
the resistance of the resistor, thus the resultant input signal voltage drop will
be maximum at the load resistor.
● Low-frequency signals flow easily through the inductor and create voltage
across the resistor.
● The inductor resists high-frequency signals, preventing them from reaching
the resistor.
Source -
 Higher Order Low Pass Filters

● The construction of higher-order filters is achieved by combining multiple

capacitors and/or inductors within a single filter circuit.
● This approach results in steeper rolloffs exceeding ±20 dB/decade.
● The higher-order filters become advantageous when a sharper rejection of
unwanted frequencies is required (rolloff greater than ±20 dB/decade.)

Second Order RCL LPF

Source - https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~tdear/ee/filters.pdf
High Pass Filter

● The high pass filter lets all the high frequencies

above a certain cutoff frequency to pass through
and blocks all the low frequencies.
● When the frequency is low, the capacitive reactance
is high, hence minimum output is available and the
gain is small.
● When the frequency is high, the capacitive
reactance is small, the output equals the input and
the gain approaches unity.
 RC High Pass Filter

● A High Pass Filter is the exact opposite to the low pass filter circuit as the
two components have been interchanged with the filters output signal being
taken from across the resistor.
● The reactance of the capacitor is very high at low frequencies so the
capacitor acts like an open circuit and blocks any input signals until the
cut-off frequency point ( ƒC ) is reached.
● The reactance of the capacitor reduces at high frequency to act more like a
short circuit allowing all of the input signal to pass directly to the output.

Source - https://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/filter/filter_3.html
RC High Pass Filter

Reactance of a Capacitor Output voltage

Cutoff Frequency Gain

RC High Pass Filter

● Frequency Response

Phase Response

Magnitude Response
RC High Pass Filter

● RC High-pass filters suffers from the same limitations as RC Low-pass

filters which is the decrease in attenuation after the cutoff frequency.
● To achieve sharper filtering, multiple capacitor-resistor circuits can be
cascaded, effectively increasing the filter order.
RC High Pass Filter

● Every additional capacitor-resistor pair, the order of the filter increases.

● Each increase in order increases the slope of the attenuation.
● Similar to RC low pass filters, RC high pass filters faces the impedance issue
during cascading.
● To ensure the impedance of the proceeding stage is 10 times higher than
the previous stage, the resistance should increase by 10 times, and the
capacitance should be 10th of the previous stage.
RL High Pass Filter

● RL high pass filter construction is similar to the RL low pass filter, with the
resistor and inductor switched.
● Inductor provides low reactance for low-frequency signal & high reactance
for a high-frequency signal.
● High-frequency signals flow easily through the inductor and create voltage
across the resistor while low-frequency signals are blocked due to the low
reactance of the inductor creating an open circuit. .
 Higher Order High Pass Filters

Second Order RCL HPF

Source - https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~tdear/ee/filters.pdf
 Band Pass Filter

● A Band Pass Filter is designed to allow a certain range of frequencies to

pass through whilst attenuating the frequencies above and below that
range.
● This filter is a combination of the low pass and high pass filter circuit to filter
the low frequency and high frequency components, respectively.
● This filter contains two cutoff frequencies, one for lower frequency (f L) and
the other for high frequency (fH).
● These filters are typically used in audio amplifier applications or circuits in
loudspeaker crossover filters or pre-amplifier tone controls.

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 Band Pass Filter

● The band pass filter passes signals within a certain “band” or “spread” of
frequencies without distorting the input signal or introducing extra noise.
● This band of frequencies can be any width and is commonly known as the
filter Bandwidth (BW).
● Bandwidth is defined as the frequency range that exists between two
specified frequency cut-off points ( ƒc ).
● The quality factor (Q) of a filter is a measure of how well a filter can isolate
the desired frequency from other frequencies

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 Band Pass Filter

● Band pass filters are known generally as second-order filters, (two-pole)

because they have “two” reactive components within the circuit design.
● The Band Pass Filter can also be used to isolate or filter out certain
frequencies that lie within a particular band of frequencies.
● Example -

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Band Pass Filter

● Frequency Response

Phase Response

Magnitude Response
Band Pass Filter

Output voltage (Low Frequency) Cutoff Frequency Quality Factor

Bandwidth
Output voltage (High Frequency)

Center (Resonant) Frequency

Gain
 Band Stop (Notch) Filter

● A Band Pass Filter is designed to reject a certain range of frequencies whilst

passing the frequencies above and below that range.
● This filter operation is opposite to the passive band pass filter and is a
combination of the low pass and high pass filter circuit.
● This filter contains two cutoff frequencies, one for lower frequency (f L) and the
other for high frequency (fH).
● If the stop band is very narrow and highly attenuated over a few hertz, then the
band stop filter is more commonly referred to as a notch filter.
● These filters are typically used in audio applications such as guitar amplifiers.

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 Band Stop (Notch) Filter

● The band stop filter attenuates signals within a certain “band” or “spread” of
frequencies which is known as the bandwidth (BW).
● When the input signal is given, the low frequencies are passed through the
low pass filter in the band stop circuit and the high frequencies are passed
through the high pass filter in the circuit.
● Similar to the band-pass filter, the band stop (band reject or notch) filter is a
second-order (two-pole) filter having two cut-off frequencies.
● Notch filters are a highly selective, high-Q, form of the band stop filter which
can be used to reject a very small band of frequencies.

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Band Stop Filter

● Frequency Response

Phase Response

Magnitude Response
Band Stop Filter

Output voltage (Low Frequency) Cutoff Frequency Quality Factor

Bandwidth
Output voltage (High Frequency)

Center (Resonant) Frequency

Gain