Capacitors and Circuits(series/parallel)

Lab Day 18 4/28/15 : Capacitors and Capacitors in Circuits

Purpose: The purpose of today's experiments is to break down capacitors and analyze the different factors (distance, area, presence of dielectric) that may increase or decrease the variables in relationship to capacitance. We will also look at capacitors in both series and parallel circuits.

The purpose of a capacitor is to store energy in an electric field. The conducting plates are seperated by a dielectric for a conductor. We started off by creating a capacitor with two aluminum foils and a lab book used to create a separation distance between the foils. The values were obtained to explain the relationship between capacitance and distance. We found that as the separation distance increases, the capacitance decreases

Capacitance with Area and Distance Calculations

We derived capacitance using the factors of A and d. Since the positive charges on one plate is attracted to the negative charges on the other plate, there is excess charges on the inside of the plate.

In parallel, the capacitance is additive and in series, the capacitance is the reciprocal add.
Next we worked on a problem where we reduced the capacitors circuits to an equivalent capacitance.

Capacitors in a Circuit Problem

In this problem, we have three capacitors that are connected to a battery of unknown voltage where we have the voltage drop of the first capacitor given. The circuit diagram is drawn where we found the (a) effective capacitance, (b) the voltage of the batery, (c) the largest capacitor, and (d) the work it takes the battery to charge up all the capacitors.

Conclusion: