Basic Introduction To Electronic Components

The Resistor

Resistors come between conductors, which conduct easily and insulators which don't
conduct. Resistance is measured in ohms after the discoverer of a law relating voltage to
current (Ohms Law).

The main function of resistors in a circuit is to control the flow of current and voltage drops
to other components. An LED (Light Emitting Diode) for example; if too much current flows
through an LED it is destroyed but to little and in will not light, so a resistor is used to limit
the current but not so big as it will limit all the current.

When a current flows through a resistor energy is wasted and the resistor heats up, you will
only notice this if the resistor working at its maximum power rating. The greater the current
flowing through the resistor hotter it gets. A battery or power supply has to do work to force
electrons through the resistor and this work ends up as heat energy in the resistor.

An important property to know about resistors is how much heat energy it can withstand
before it's damaged or causes a fire. Resistors can in this Lab dissipate about 0.25 Watts, so
be careful when choosing your values.

It's difficult to make a resistor to an exact value, so resistances are given a tolerance. This is
expressed as being plus or minus a percentage. A ±10% resistor with a stated value of 100
ohms could have a resistance anywhere between 90 ohms and 110 ohms.

In circuit diagrams you will often see an 'R' instead of omega to represent ohms. This is a
convention that dates from before the days of computers and laser printers when Greek letters
were rarely found on the keyboards.
The symbol and a few examples of this type is shown below:

Carbon Film Metal Film Thick Film Plate

Resistor Colour Code

The resistor colour code is a way of showing the value of a resistor. Instead of writing the
resistance on its body, which would often be too small to read, a colour code is used.
Different colours represent the numbers 0 to 9. The first two coloured bands on the body are
the first two digits of the resistance, and the third band is the 'multiplier'. Multiplier just
means the number of zeroes to add after the first two digits. Red represents the number 2, so a
resistor with red, red, red bands has a resistance of 2 followed by 2 followed by 2 zeroes,
which is 2200 ohms or 2.2 kilohms.
The final band is the tolerance (the accuracy ± x %). All resistors have a tolerance which is
shown by the last band.

1st 2nd 3rd 4th

Colour
Band Band Band Band

Black 0 0 1
Brown 1 1 10
Red 2 2 100
Orange 3 3 1000
Yellow 4 4 10000
Green 5 5 100000
Blue 6 6 1000000
Purple 7 7
Grey 8 8
White 9 9
Red 1%
Gold 5%
Silver 10%

Here are some examples:

Yellow, Purple, Red, Gold = 47 x 100 = 4 700 ohms = 4.7 kilohms + 5%

Brown, Black, Yellow, Gold = 10 x 10 000 = 100 kilohms + 5%
Yellow, Purple, Black, Silver = 47 x 1 = 47 ohms + 10%
Brown, Black, Red, Red = 10 x 100 = 1 000 ohms = 1 kilohms + 1%
Brown, Black, Green, Gold = 10 x 100 000 = 1 000 kilohms = 1 Megohms + 5%
Variable Resistors

Variable resistors are resistors whose resistance can be varied by moving a knob or slider.
Variable resistors can also be called presets or pots, they have a metal wiper resting on a
resistive track usually made from carbon. The wiper moves along the track as the preset is
moved. The current flows through the wiper, then through part of the carbon track or through
the carbon track then through the wiper. The more of the track it has to go through the greater
the resistance.

Pots have three legs. The top leg connects to the wiper (2) and the other two legs to the two
ends of the track (1 and 3). Generally two of the legs are use if you wish it to act like a
variable resistor or all three if it is to be a potential divider but this depends on the operation
you want it to perform.
The Capacitor

Capacitors are components that store an electrical charge. Like tiny batteries they can cause a
current to flow in a circuit. But they only do this for a short time, they cannot deliver a
sustained current. They can be charged up with energy from a battery, then return that energy
back later. The capacitance of a capacitor is a measure of how much energy/charge it can
store.

In its simplest form a capacitor consists of two separated metal plates with air or another non-
conductive material filling the gap, the bigger the plates the bigger the capacitance. To stop
capacitors becoming impractically large they can be rolled up.

Another way of increasing the capacitance is to put some non-conducting material between
the plates. This is called a dielectric material. When a capacitor charges up the protons and
electrons in the dielectric separate out a little, this allows more charge to be stored on the
plates than usual. Dielectrics are made of various materials Ceramic, paper, polyester,
polystyrene, mica, e.t.c.

Capacitance is measured in Farads after the scientist Michael Faraday. One Farad is a very
big unit and are usually found in the range of pico to micro farads.

Capacitors come in two flavours, electrolytic and non-electrolytic.

Electrolytic capacitors use special dielectrics sometimes a solid but the must common types
are a liquid or paste which is formed into a very thin dielectric in the factory. Non-electrolytic
capacitors have solid dielectrics.
The symbol for electrolytic capacitors and a few examples of this type is shown below:

Electrolytic Tantalum

The symbol for non-electrolytic capacitors and a few examples of this type is shown below:

Polyester Polystyrene

Ceramic Disk Multi-layer Ceramic

Electrolytic capacitors can store more charge but there are a couple of problems. They Have a
polarity and must be connected the right way around in a circuit. They also slowly leak their
charge, and they have quite large tolerances i.e 10% to 20%. Where as non-electrolytic
capacitors still leak but not as fast as electolytics and do not have a polarity problem but store
less charge.

When a capacitor is connected to a source it begins to charge. The current flows rapidly at
first then more slowly as it gets to maximum its charge. Charge builds up on the two plates,
negative charge on one plate and the same amount of positive charge on the other. The
positive charge results from electrons leaving one of the plates and leaving positively-charged
protons behind. But as the capacitor fills with charge it starts to oppose the current flowing in
the circuit. It is as if another battery were working against the first. The current decreases and
the capacitor charges more slowly. The plates become full of charge and it takes practically
forever to squeeze the last drop in, until no current flows, and the circuit acts like an open.

If a capacitor is shorted then it discharges. Charge flows out of the capacitor rapidly at first,
then progressively more slowly. The last little drop just trickles out. The speed at which the
capacitor empties or charges depends on the resistance. If a simple wire shorts out a capacitor
then it empties in a flash, often with a spark if it's a big capacitor.

We've seen that when a capacitor is fully charged the current stops. In other words a
continuous current cannot flow through a capacitor. A continuous current is called a direct
current or D.C.

An alternating current (A.C.) however can flow through a capacitor. An alternating current is
one which is continually changing its direction. Mains is an A.C. and changes its direction 50
times a second (50Hz). An alternating current continually charges and discharges a capacitor
and hence is able to keep current flowing.
Semiconductor Introduction

Now we come to what is probably the most important discovery in electronics which
happened last century. Without this discovery we wouldn't have televisions, computers, space
rocket, CD players, etc. Unfortunately it's also one of the hardest areas to understand in
electronics.

Recall that the reason what makes metals such good conductors, this is that they have lots of
electrons which are so loosely held that they're easily able to move when a voltage is applied.
Insulators have fixed electrons and so are not able to conduct. Certain materials, called
semiconductors, are insulators that have a few loose electrons. They are partly able to
conduct a current.

The free electrons in semiconductors leave behind a fixed positive charge when they move
about (the protons in the atoms they come from). Charged atoms are called ions. The positive
ions in semiconductors are able to capture electrons from nearby atoms. When an electron is
captured another atom in the semiconductor becomes a positive ion. This behaviour can be
thought of as a 'hole' moving about the material, moving in just the same way that electrons
move. So now there are two ways of conducting a current through a semiconductor, electrons
moving in one direction and holes in the other. There are two kinds of current carriers.

The holes don't really move of course. It is just fixed positive ions grabbing neighbouring
electrons, but it appears as if holes are moving.

In a pure semiconductor there are not enough free electrons and holes to be of much use.
Their number can be greatly increased however by adding an impurity, called a donor. If the
donor gives up some extra free electrons we get an n-type semiconductor (n for negative). If
the donor soaks up some of the free electrons we get a p-type semiconductor (p for positive).
In both cases the impurity donates extra current carriers to the semiconductor. Adding
impurities is called dopping.

In n-type semiconductors there are more electrons than holes and they are the main current
carriers. In p-type semiconductors there are more holes than electrons and they are the main
current carriers. The donor atoms become either positive ions (n-type) or negative ions (p-
type).
The most common semiconductors are silicon (basically sand) and germanium. Common
donors are arsenic and phosphorus.

When we combine n-type and p-type semiconductors together we make useful devices, like
transistors, diodes and chips.

The Diode

A diode consists of a piece of n-type and a piece of p-type semiconductor joined together to
form a junction.

Electrons in the n-type half of the diode are repelled away from the junction by the negative
ions in the p-type region, and holes in the p-type half are repelled by the positive ions in the
n-type region. A space on either side of the junction is left without either kind of current
carriers. This is known as the depletion layer because there are no current carriers in this
layer, so current can flow. The depletion layer is, in effect, an insulator.

Now consider what would happen if we connected a small voltage to the diode. Connected
one way it would attract the current carriers away from the junction and make the depletion
layer wider. Connected the other way it would repel the carriers and drive them towards the
junction, so reducing the depletion layer. In neither case would any current flow because
there would always be some of the depletion layer left.

Now consider increasing the voltage. In one direction there is still no current because the
depletion layer is even wider ( reverse biased ), but in the other direction the layer disappears
completely and current can flow ( forward biased ). Above a certain voltage the diode acts
like a conductor. As electrons and holes meet each other at the junction they combine and
disappear.
Thus a diode is a device which is an insulator in one direction and a conductor in the other.
Diodes are extremely useful components. We can stop currents going where we don't want
them to go. For example we can protect a circuit against the battery being connected
backwards which might otherwise damage it.

The symbol and a few examples of this type is shown below (Note the cathode on the
component is shown by a ring at one end):

Small Signal Zenner

LEDs (Light Emitting Diode)

Light emitting diodes (LEDs) are special diodes that give out light when they conduct. The
fact that they only conduct in one direction is often incidental to their use in a circuit. They
are usually just being used as lights. They are small and cheap and they last practically
forever, unlike traditional light bulbs which can burn out.

The light comes from the energy given up when electrons combine with holes at the junction.
The colour of the light depends on the impurity in the semiconductor. It is easy to make
bright red, green and yellow LEDs but technology cant make cheap LEDs of other colours
like white or blue.

The symbol and a few examples of this type is shown below(Note the cathode on the
component is shown as a flat edge or the short leg):
The Transistor

Transistors underpin the whole of modern day electronics. They are found everywhere - in
watches, calculators, microwaves, hi-fi's. A Pentium(tm) computer chip contains over a
million transistors!

This is a picture of the first transistor ever created

Transistors work in two ways. They can work as switches (turning currents on and off) and as
amplifiers (making currents bigger). We'll be looking at them as switches here. To understand
them as amplifiers would involve a little mathematics your lectures should cover both these
actions. When acting as an amplifier they operate in the linear mode and as a switch they are
forced into saturation (on) or cut off (off).

Transistors are sandwiches of three pieces of semiconductor material. A thin slice of n-type
or p-type semiconductor is sandwiched between two layers of the opposite type. This gives
two junctions rather than the one found in a diode. If the thin slice is n-type the transistor is
called a p-n-p transistor, and if the thin slice is p-type it is called a n-p-n transistor. The
middle layer is always called the base, and the outer two layers are called the collector and
the emitter.

We will consider the (more common) n-p-n transistor. In a n-p-n transistor electrons are the
main current carriers (because n-type material predominates).

When no voltage is connected to the base then the transistor is equivalent to two diodes
connected back to back. Recall that current can only flow one way through a diode. A pair of
back-to-back diodes can't conduct at all.

If a small voltage is applied to the base (enough to remove the depletion layer in the lower
junction), current flows from emitter to base like a normal diode. Once current is flowing
however it is able to sweep straight through the very thin base region and into the collector,
only a small part of the current flows out of the base. The transistor is now conducting
through both junctions. A few of the electrons are consumed by the holes in the p-type region
of the base, but most of them go straight through.
Electrons enter the emitter from the battery and come out of the collector. (Isn't that rather
illogical you might say, electrons emitted from the collector? Yes it is, but the parts of a
transistor are named with respect to conventional current, an imaginary current which flows
in the opposite direction to real electron current.)

Now you can see how a transistor acts as a switch. A small voltage applied to the base
switches the transistor on, allowing a current to flow in the rest of the transistor.

NPN and PNP Transistor components look identical to each other the only way to tell the
difference is by the component number.

The symbol and a few examples of this type is shown below (on transistors you need a data
sheet to tell you which pin is which, but some you can make a guess i.e. the collector lead on
a metal can transistor is connected to the case and the metal tag is next to the emitter lead):

N-P-N Transistor P-N-P Transistor

There are many different packages a transistor can come in these are but a few

E-Line Package TO-18 Package SOT-32 Package