Capacitor Investigation Report

Capacitor Investigation Report

Aim: the aim of this investigation is to study capacitors charging and

discharging.

A capacitor is charged by placing it in a circuit with a resistor and

a power source. When electrons flow round the circuit they can not

cross the gap the capacator makes. A negative charge builds up on this

side of the capacitor whilst on the other a positive charge because of

this. A potential difference across the gap now occurs causing the

charging to slow down. When the voltage across the gap is equal to the

voltage of the power supply there is no current as there is no voltage

difference/ potential difference and the capacator is now fully

charged. A capacitor can then be used in a circuit on its own with out

a power source the charge of the capacitor gradually leaves it, and is

discharging.

Method:

In This experiment we charged a 1000μF capacitor and then discharged

it using two circuits. We studied the capacitor charging by using a

voltmeter in parallel and a 10kΩ resistor in series. Every 5 seconds

the voltage was taking down, we then repeated this process but with

the capacitor discharging.

These were the circuits used:

[IMAGE]

And these were are results:

time (s)

charging(V)

discharging(V)

ln discharging(V)

0

0

10

2.30

5

4.26

6.28

1.84

10

6.24

4.24

1.44

15

7.84

2.78

1.02

20

8.9

1.98

0.68

25

9.63

1.33

0.29

30

10.14

0.96

-0.04

35

10.5

0.65

-0.43

40

10.72

0.46

-0.78

45

10.87

0.35

-1.05

50

10.99

0.