Investigating the behavior of resistor-capacitor circuits

Darwin James J. Tangonan, Toffee S. Galolo, Walter S. Go

National Institute of Physics, University of the Philippines – Diliman, Philippines

*Corresponding author: [email protected]

Abstract
An RC circuit is an example of a direct-current circuit wherein its direction does not change over time. To better
understand the premise of a circuit, Kirchoff’s rule is applied. This will play an important role in determining the
overall potential difference in a circuit. Also, the time constant is a vital part in describing how fast a capacitor
charges/discharge. In this experiment, the behavior of a simple RC Circuit is observed and compared to its
theoretical counterpart. Two modes were considered: charging and discharging mode of the RC Circuit. Each mode
was performed for two different resistors, with 218kΩ and 678kΩ resistance. The time elapsed as a 1mF capacitor
charges or discharges in constant intervals of voltage is observed and recorded. The results confirmed the predicted
equations, with deviation in time constant being only 1.647%.

Keywords: Electromagnetism, RC Circuits, Resistor, Capacitor, Charging and Discharging, Kirchoff’s rules

1 Introduction
In electromagnetism, one of its primary applications in everyday life is found in circuits. An electric circuit
is any path or loop where an electric current can move through. It is composed of several elements such as
resistors, capacitors, inductors, and a power source where the voltage is produced. In this paper, a basic
circuit which contains a resistor, and a capacitor will be discussed: the RC circuit. [1]
The RC circuit is an example of a direct-current circuit wherein its direction does not change through
time. This type of circuit mainly focuses on the idea of charging and discharging a capacitor. Furthermore,
there are two terms that are very important in circuits: junctions and loops. The junction refers to a point in
the circuit where two or more currents meet. On the other hand, a loop refers to a closed circuit.
To better understand the concept of RC circuits, Kirchoff’s rule is applied. This rule states that in a
circuit, the sum of all the currents I that passes through a junction, and the sum of all the potential differences
V around a circuit loop, should be conserved. Thus, for a simple RC circuit loop, the formula given below
can be established:
𝑞
𝑉 − 𝐼𝑅 − =0 (1)
𝐶

where R denotes the resistor’s resistance of the resistor, 𝒒 denotes the charge of the capacitor, and C denotes
the capacitance of the capacitor.
From Equation 1, current 𝑰 can be denoted as the rate of charge dq/dt, which gives a differential
equation in 𝒒. Solving for q with appropriate initial conditions of zero capacitor initial charge gives
𝑞 = 𝐶𝑉(1 − 𝑒 −𝑡/𝑅𝐶 ) (2)
Finally, dividing both sides by capacitance C will give the potential difference V in a circuit for charging a
capacitor, in terms of time t.

𝑉(𝑡) = 𝑉0 (1 − 𝑒 𝑡/𝑅𝐶 ) (3)

Where V0 denotes the voltage of the capacitor.

Moreover, for discharging a capacitor, the same derivation can be followed. However, in discharging
a capacitor, the power source is now removed, hence the potential 𝑽 is now equal to zero, and the capacitor
now has nonzero initial voltage 𝑽𝟎 . Consequently, this will give a new formula,

𝑉(𝑡) = 𝑉0 𝑒 𝑡/𝑅𝐶 (4)

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 Additionally, the time constant 𝝉, given by 𝝉 = 𝑹𝑪, is a value which describes how fast a capacitor
charges. When 𝝉 is small, the capacitor charges faster. Otherwise, the capacitor charges slower.
In this experiment, the relationship between two different resistors and one capacitor was analyzed.
The rate at which the capacitor charges or discharges was also studied. Lastly, the experiment aims to
measure the time constant of a simple RC circuit in two different modes, charging and discharging.
2 Methodology
In this experiment, two setups were considered, one for charging and one for discharging a capacitor. The
setups of the RC Circuit are as shown in Figure 1; a capacitor and two different resistors were prepared.
The indicated capacitance of the capacitor used is 1 mF, and the indicated resistance of the resistors
are 220 kΩ (Resistor 1) and 680 kΩ (Resistor 2). The actual resistance of the resistors and capacitance of the
capacitor were then measured using the multimeter.

Figure 1: Schematic diagrams for (a) RC Charging Mode and (b) RC Discharging Mode

In the RC Charging Mode, the capacitor was first allowed to discharge by completing the circuit
without the power supply. The capacitor was fully discharged when the reading on the voltmeter only showed
zero or until the voltage reading no longer decreased. The power supply was then connected back into the
circuit with the wires connecting to the resistors still disconnected. [2]
The power supply was set to 12 V and a timer was prepared. As soon as the wires of the power
supply and the resistor were connected, the timer was turned on. For Resistor 1, the time was recorded for
every 0.1 V increase in the charge in the capacitor until the charge reaches 1.0V. Moreover, for Resistor 2,
the time is recorded for every 0.2 V increase in the charge of the capacitor until the charge in the capacitor
reaches 2.0 V.
For the RC Discharging Mode, the connection to the power supply was first closed, and the capacitor
is charged until 12 V. The stopwatch was turned on immediately after disconnecting the circuit from the
positive terminal of the power supply. For Resistor 1, the time was recorded for every 0.1 V decrease in the
charge reading of the capacitor until it reaches 11 V, and for Resistor 2, the time was recorded for every 0.2
V decrease in the charge of the capacitor until it reaches 10 V.
3 Results and Discussions
Preliminarily, the actual values of each component were measured, the values can be seen below in table 1:
Table 1: Values of circuit components
Listed Value Measured Value
Resistor 1 220 kΩ ± 5% 218 kΩ
Resistor 2 680 kΩ ± 10% 678 kΩ
Capacitor 1000 μF 1000 μF

In analyzing the time constant, the exponential nature of equations (2) and (3) are rather difficult to
work with. It would be more practical to linearize said equations. doing such would lead to equations below:

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 𝑉
𝑡 = −𝑅𝐶 𝑙𝑛 (1 − 𝑉 ) (5)
0

𝑉
𝑡 = −𝑅𝐶 𝑙𝑛 (𝑉 ) (6)
0

where (5) and (6) correspond to charging and discharging respectively.

The data has been plotted and fit in Figures 1 and 2. Following Equations (5) and (6), the slopes of
the linear fit represent the negative of the time constant, −𝑹𝑪 (SI Unit 𝑠).

Figure 2: Linearized Voltage-Time Plot for RC Charging Circuit

Figure 3: Linearized Voltage-Time Plot for RC Discharging Circuit

Having 𝑹𝟐 > 𝟎. 𝟗𝟗𝟖 in all cases show that there are strong linear correlations between both the time
and adjusted voltage, highly suggesting that the theoretical equations hold. Negligible deviations can be
attributed to human error, specifically in having recorded times being dependent on reaction time. Additional
possible sources of error could be due to internal resistances present in the circuit, found in the wiring or
multimeter, as well as the capacitor possibly dissipating energy since it is not a perfect ideal capacitor.
It is important to note that for an ideal voltmeter, the resistance should be infinite so it would not
affect the circuit. However, since this is not physically feasible, an unwanted voltmeter internal resistance
would be present and vary the effective resistance of the circuit by a noticeable amount.
Table 2: Comparison of time constants for the 1 mF Capacitor
Resistor (𝐤𝛀) 𝐑𝐂𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐨 (𝐬) 𝝉𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞 (𝐬) 𝝐𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞 [%] 𝝉𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞 (𝐬) 𝝐𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞 [%]
218 218 214.41 1.647 218.40 0.1835
678 678 677.89 0.01622 679.48 0.2183

Since the time constant has a theoretical value of 𝑹𝑪, the experimental values were compared, as
shown in table 2. The results show a maximal discrepancy of 𝜖 = 1.647%, which is well within reasonable
error, and can be accounted for in the uncertainty brought by the tolerance of resistors (5%). This shows that
the experiment was successful in confirming the predicted behavior of simple RC-circuits when charging
and discharging.

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4 Conclusion
As the results confirm, a smaller time constant 𝜏 makes the capacitor charge faster, and a larger 𝜏 makes the
capacitor charge slower. This can be seen in Figure 2 and 3, as the resistor with larger resistance had a steeper
slope. Hence, the experiment holds true to the behavior of the time constant.
Additionally, having the experimental fit match Equation (5) and (6) confirms that the capacitor
charging and discharging indeed follow exponential decay. This would imply that it would take infinitely
long for the capacitor to be either fully charged or fully discharged under the resistor-series setup.
Nevertheless, external factors which caused disparities in the experiment were considered: (a)
recorded times being dependent on the reaction time of the researchers, (b) internal resistance of the
multimeter, and (c) unwanted energy dissipating from the capacitor. With these errors, some
recommendations can be made for similar research: (a) observing the set-ups under longer periods of time
so that the exponential behavior can be further observed, (b) using a voltage sensor to record times, and (c)
doing the procedure with more than one capacitor.

5 References
[1] D. Halliday, R. Resnick, J. Walker, Oscillations, in Fundamentals of Physics, 10th Ed (John Wiley
& Sons, Inc., Hoboken, NJ USA, 2014)
[2] National Institute of Physics. (2023). Physics 107.1 Experiment 3 (Capacitors and RC Circuits)
Prelab Manual. Diliman, Quezon City: University of the Philippines Diliman.

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6 Appendix

Figure 4: Snippet of original table of data

Table 3: Contributions of members

Member Contributions
Galolo, Toffee Data Collection, Abstract, Introduction, Conclusion
Go, Walter Data Collection, Abstract, Methodology,
Tangonan, Darwin Data Collection, Abstract, Analysis, Results & Discussion,
Conclusion

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