EEE251 BASIC ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING

Lecture 11:
Sinusoidal Alternating Waveforms (AC)

Instructor: N. Thwala

June, 2023
Lecture Objectives
• Become familiar with the characteristics of a sinusoidal waveform, including
its general format, average value, and effective value.
• Be able to determine the phase relationship between two sinusoidal
waveforms of the same frequency.
• Understand how to calculate the average and effective values of any
waveform.
• Become familiar with the use of instruments designed to measure ac
quantities.

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Introduction
• Of particular interest is the time-varying voltage that is commercially available in large
quantities and is commonly called the ac voltage.
• (The letters ac are an abbreviation for alternating current.)
• Each waveform in the next slide is an alternating waveform available from
commercial supplies.
• The term alternating indicates only that the waveform alternates between two
prescribed levels in a set time sequence.
• To be absolutely correct, the term sinusoidal, square-wave, or triangular must also be
applied.

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Alternating waveforms

The term alternating indicates only that the waveform alternates

between two prescribed levels in a set time sequence.

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Various ac Voltage Sources
An ac generator (or alternator) powered by water power, gas, or nuclear fusion,
wind is the primary component in the energy-conversion process.

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 Sinusoidal ac Voltage
Characteristics and Definitions
The sinusoidal waveform (sine wave) is the fundamental alternating current (ac) and
alternating voltage waveform.

Electrical sine waves are

Named from the mathematical
function with the same shape.

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 Sinusoidal ac Voltage
Characteristics and Definitions

Period, T=T1=T2=T3, Frequency f=1/T

Peak value= Em. Peak-to-peak value=Ep-p, Instantaneous values, e1, e2
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 Sinusoidal ac Voltage
Characteristics and Definitions
Definitions
• Waveform: The path traced by a quantity, such as voltage, plotted as a function of
some variable such as time, position, degree, radius, temperature and so on.
• Instantaneous value: The magnitude of a waveform at any instant of time; denoted by
the lowercase letters (e1, e2).
• (Peak) amplitude: The maximum value of the waveform as measured from its average
(or mean) value, denoted by the uppercase letters Em (source of voltage) and Vm (voltage
drop across a load).

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 Sinusoidal ac Voltage
Characteristics and Definitions
Definitions
• Peak value: The maximum instantaneous value of a function as measured from zero-
volt level.
• Peak-to-peak value: Denoted by Ep-p or Vp-p, the full voltage between positive and
negative peaks of the waveform, that is, the sum of the magnitude of the positive and
negative peaks.
• Periodic waveform: A waveform that continually repeats itself after the same time
interval.

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 Sinusoidal ac Voltage
Characteristics and Definitions
Definitions
• Period (T): The time interval between successive repetitions of a periodic waveform
(the period T1 = T2 = T3), as long as successive similar points of the periodic waveform
are used in determining T
• Cycle: The portion of a waveform contained in one period of time
• Frequency: (Hertz) the number of cycles that occur in 1 s

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Example 1
For the sinusoidal waveform in Figure:
a. What is the peak value?
b. What is the instantaneous value at 0.3 s and 0.6 s?
c. What is the peak-to-peak value of the waveform?
d. What is the period of the waveform?
e. How many cycles are shown?
f. What is the frequency of the waveform?

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 Defined polarities and direction
• The polarity and current direction will be for an instant in time in the positive portion of
the sinusoidal waveform.
• In the figure, a lowercase letter is employed for polarity and current direction to
indicate that the quantity is time dependent; that is, its magnitude will change with time.
• For any quantity that will not change with time, an uppercase letter such as V or I is
used.

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The Sine Wave
• The sinusoidal waveform is the only alternating waveform whose shape is
unaffected by the response characteristics of R (resistor), L (inductor), and C
(capacitor) elements.
• The voltage across (or current through) a resistor, coil, or capacitor is sinusoidal in
nature.

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The Sine Wave
• The unit of measurement for the horizontal axis can be time (as appearing in the figures thus far),
degrees, or radians.
• The quantity π is the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter.

• For 180° and 360°, the two units of measurement are related as follows:

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The Sine Wave
• The velocity with which the radius vector rotates about the center is called the angular
velocity (ω) , and can be determined:

• Since (ω) is typically provided in radians per second, the angle α obtained using
α = ωt is usually in radians.

2𝜋 2𝜋𝑡
𝑇= = (seconds)
𝜔 𝛼
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Example 2
Given 𝝎 = 200 rad/s, determine how long it will take the sinusoidal waveform
to pass through an angle of 90°.

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 General Format for the Sinusoidal
Voltage or Current
• The basic mathematical format for the sinusoidal waveform is:
or
Where:
Am is the peak value of the waveform
α is the unit of measure for the horizontal axis
ω is the angular velocity
• The angle at which a particular voltage level is attained can be determined by rearranging the equation

• Which can be written as:

or

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Example 3
a. Determine the angle at which the magnitude of the
sinusoidal function
b. Determine the time at which the magnitude is attained.

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 General Format for the Sinusoidal
Voltage or Current
• For electrical quantities such as current and voltage, the general format is:

where: the capital letters with the subscript m represent the amplitude, and the lower case
letters i and e represent the instantaneous value of current and voltage, respectively, at
any time t.

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Example 4:
If v = 40 V at 𝝰 = 30 and t = 1 ms, determine the mathematical expression for the
sinusoidal voltage.
Solution

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Phase Relations
• If the waveform is shifted to the right or left of 0°:
where: θ is the angle (in degrees or radians) that the waveform has been shifted
• If the wave form passes through the horizontal axis with a positive-going (increasing
with the time) slope before 0°:
• If the waveform passes through the horizontal axis with a positive-going slope after 0°:

• If a sinusoidal expression should appear as

• the negative sign is associated with the sine portion of the expression, not the peak value Em .
• In other words, the expression, if not for convenience, would be written

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Phase Relations
• If the waveform crosses the horizontal axis with a positive-going slope 90° (𝜋/2)
sooner, as shown in Fig. it is called a cosine wave; that is:

• The terms lead and lag are used to indicate the relationship between two sinusoidal
waveforms of the same frequency plotted on the same set of axes.
• The cosine curve is said to lead the sine curve by 90°.
• The sine curve is said to lag the cosine curve by 90°.
• 90° is referred to as the phase angle between the two waveforms
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Phase Shift
Example of a wave that lags the reference

Notice that a lagging sine

wave is below the axis at 0o

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Phase Shift
Example of a wave that leads the reference

…and the equation has a positive phase shift

Notice that a leading sine
wave is above the axis at 0o
v = 30 sin (ωt + 45o) V

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Example 5
Find the phase relationship between the following waveforms:

Solution

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Phase Shift
Three passive circuit parameters, inductance (L), capacitance (C) and resistance (R) may be
present in AC circuits. Ohm’s law is applicable for determining the current in the circuit.

=R
= jXL
= - jXC

RESISTANCE

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Phase Shift
INDUCTANCE

CAPACITANCE

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The Oscilloscope
• The oscilloscope is an instrument that will display the sinusoidal alternating waveform
in a way that will permit the reviewing of all of the waveform’s characteristics. (It can
display only what you feed into it.)
• The screen has a standard appearance, with 10 horizontal divisions and 8 vertical
divisions. The distance between divisions is 1 cm on both scales.
• The vertical scale is set to display voltage levels, whereas the horizontal scale is
always in units of time.
• Remember, the oscilloscope display presents a sinusoidal voltage versus time, not
degrees or radians. Further, the vertical scale is always a voltage sensitivity, never
units of amperes.
• Phase Measurements
• When determining the phase measurement we first note that each sinusoidal
function has the same frequency, permitting the use of either waveform to
determine the period.
• Since the full period represents a cycle of 360°, the following ratio can be
formed:

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Example 6: Fundamental Calculation
For the oscilloscope pattern of Fig.:
a. Determine the peak amplitude.
b. Find the period.
c. Calculate the frequency.

Solution

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Average Value
• Understanding the average value using a sand analogy:
• The average height of the sand is that height obtained if the
distance from one end to the other is maintained while the sand
is levelled off.

• The algebraic sum of the areas must be determined, since some

area contributions will be from below the horizontal axis.
• Area above the axis is assigned a positive sign and area below the axis is assigned a negative sign.
• The average value of any current or voltage is the value indicated on a dc meter – over a
complete cycle the average value is the equivalent dc value.

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Example 7: Average Value
Question: Find the average value of the periodic
waveform shown in the Fig. over one full cycle.

Solution:

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Effective or Root Mean Square (rms) Values
• Irrespective of direction, current of any magnitude through a resistor will deliver power
to that resistor – during the positive and negative portions of a sinusoidal ac current,
power is being delivered at each instant of time to the resistor.
• The net power flow will equal twice that delivered by either the positive or the negative
regions of sinusoidal quantity
• The formula for power delivered by the ac supply at any time is:

• The average power delivered by the ac source is just the first term, since the average
value of a cosine wave is zero even though the wave may have twice the frequency of
the original input current waveform.

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Effective (rms) Values
• The equivalent dc value of a sinusoidal current or voltage is 1 / √2 or 0.707 of its peak value.

• The equivalent dc value is called the rms or effective value of the sinusoidal quantity.
• The relationship between the peak value and the rms value is:

Where: Im and Em are max (peak) values

• Instrumentation
• A true rms meter will read the effective value of any waveform and is not limited to only
sinusoidal waveforms.

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Example 8: Effective (rms) Values
Find the effective value of the periodic
waveform shown in Fig.

Solution
𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑎(𝑣 2 (𝑡))
𝑉𝑟𝑚𝑠 =
𝑇

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Example 9: Effective (rms) Values
Find the rms values of the sinusoidal waveform in each part in Fig.

Solution
(a) Irms = 0.707(12 x 103 A) = 8.48 mA.
(b) Again Irms = 8.48 mA. Note that frequency did not change the effective value in (b) compared to (a).
(c)Vrms = 0.707(169.73 V) = 120 V, the same as available from a home outlet.

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 Next Lecture:
Phasors and Complex Numbers

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