23EST 114

Basics of Electronics Engineering

Module I

T KMCE ECE Prof. Ajitha 1

 CAPACITORS
 A passive component which has the ability or ‘capacity’ to
store energy in the form of electrical charge producing a
potential difference across its plates.

 Consists of two or more parallel conductive plates which

are not connected or touching each other, but are
electrically separated either by air or by some form of a
good insulating material such as waxed paper, mica,
ceramic, plastic or some form of a liquid gel as used in
electrolytic capacitors. The insulating layer between
capacitor plates is commonly called the dielectric.
 Capacitors

Ceramic capacitor -disc/tube type Electrolytic capacitors Paper capacitors

Ceramic/mica
capacitors
with colour coding
Gang capacitors

Trimmer capacitors
Capacitor contd….
The ability of a capacitor to store charge on its plates in the form
of an electrostatic field is called the capacitance of the capacitor.

Capacitance,

where A is the area of plates,

d is the separation between the plates,
ε0 is the permittivity of free space ( 8.854 x 10-12 F/m )

εr is the relative permittivity of the dielectric material

Capacitor contd….
Unit of capacitance is Farad (abbreviated to F)
named after the British physicist Michael Faraday.
The amount of charge stored in the capacitor is
proportional to applied voltage and the
capacitance value
Q α V or Q = CV

Symbol

Fixed capacitor Variable Capacitor

Color Coding of Capacitors
 Sometimes capacitors just show bands like resistors when printing is
tough on them. The colours should be read like the resistor code, the top
three colour bands giving the value in pF. The 4th band and 5th band are
for tolerance and voltage rating respectively. For example: brown, black,
orange means 10000pF = 10nF = 0.01µF.
Color Coding contd…
Electrolytic Capacitors
◼ There are two designs of electrolytic capacitors:
◼ (i) Axial where the leads are attached to each
end and
◼ (ii) Radial where both leads are at the same end.
 Capacitance Value Coding using Numbers
Small value capacitors have their values printed but without a multiplier.
 If the number printed is less than 1 capacitance value is in micro Farads
For example 0.1 means 0.1µF.
 If the number written on the capacitor is greater than one, the value will
be in pF. For example: 10 means 10 pF and 0.1 means 0.1 μF.
 If the letter n, M or k is between two numerals, the value of the capacitor can be
obtained by putting a decimal in place of the letter and multiplying by the factor nF,
μF or kpF respectively.
47n means 47 nF 47M (47u) means 47 μF.
n47 means 0.47nF 4k7 means 4.7 kpF 10k
means 10 kpF or 0.01 μF. 2M2 means 2.2 μF.
◼ 4R7 means 4.7 pF
Capacitance Value Coding contd…

 If there are three digits in the number, the third number is the multiplier and
the value will be in pF.
104 means 10,0000 pF or 0.1 μF
If the letters K or M follows the three digit number, it implies the tolerance
value 10% and 20% respectively.
104K means 0.1 μF ± 10%
 Tolerance codes
Code Tolerance Code Tolerance
A ±0.05pF K ±10%
B ±0.1pF L ±15%
C ±0.25pF M ±20%
D ±0.5pF N ±30%
E ±0.5% P -0%+100%
F ±1% S -20%+50%
G ±2% W -0%+200%
H ±3% X -20%+40%
J ±5% Z -20%+80%
Examples:

Code Value Code Value

0.1 0.1μF 10n 10nF

10 10pF 1M 1μF

104 100000pF(0.1μF) 2M2 2.2 μF

10k 10kpF(0.01μF) 4k7 4.7kpF

(0.0047μF)
Examples:
 Specifications of a
 Capacitance:
capacitor
Value of the capacitor Expressed in pico-Farads (pF), nano-Farads (nF) or micro-
Farads (μF) and is marked onto the body of the capacitor as numbers, letters or
coloured bands.
 Tolerance:
The tolerance value is the extent to which the actual capacitance is allowed to
vary from its nominal value.
 Voltage rating:
Maximum voltage that can be applied across it. If the applied voltage exceeds
the capacitor may get damaged. Break down voltage is the voltage above which
the dielectric of the capacitor will break down and conduct.
 Power Factor:
The quality of a capacitor is indicated by power factor. It is the fraction of the
input power dissipated as heat loss in the capacitor. Power factor is essentially
that of the dielectric.
Specifications contd…
 Frequency range:
Range of frequencies over which the capacitor can be used.
 Temperature coefficient:
The Temperature Coefficient of a capacitor is the maximum change in its
capacitance over a specified temperature range. The temperature coefficient of a
capacitor is generally expressed linearly as parts per million per degree
centigrade (PPM/oC), or as a percent change over a particular range of
temperatures
 Q factor.
The quality of a capacitor is expressed in terms of a parameter called Q factor.
It is the reciprocal of the power factor.

Q= =
Types of Capacitors
1. Mica Capacitor
•Made from plates of aluminium/tin foil separated by sheets of mica.
•The plates are connected to two electrodes.
•The mica capacitors have excellent characteristics under stress of
temperature variations and high voltage applications (~500 V).
• Available capacitances range from 5 to 10,000 pF.

Properties
• Small capacitance values
• High voltage rating
• Low loss factor
• High stability

Suitable for high frequency operations

2. Paper Capacitor

•Varies from 0.0005µF to 2µF with voltage rating upto 1000V

•Have longer life
•Can be used in both ac and dc circuits
3.Ceramic Capacitors
Available in disc, tubular and button type.
Tubular Ceramic capacitor

 1.5mm to 3mm diameter

 15mm to 30mm long
 Tubular Ceramic Capacitor
 The required materials are ground in ball mills to
fine powder
 The powder is mixed with flux, compressed and
heated
 After cooling it is ground again and mixed with
water and a binder such as gum
 The paste so formed is extruded into a hollow
tubular shape, which is then cut into the required
lengths
 They are then coated with silver solution on both
inside and outside surfaces
 Radial leads are soldered to the silver coatings and
outer surface may be protected by lacquer coating
 Finally the pieces are tested and rated accordingly.
Disc type Ceramic
Capacitor
Ceramic paste is coated on a glass substrate in the


form of a sheet
 After oven treatment, thin metallic layers of silver or
platinum solution are deposited on the ceramic
covering
 After drying the coat, circular discs are cut from the
sheet
 Contact leads are then soldered on both sides of each
disc
 Plastic moulding or lacquering follows to encapsulate
the product
 4.Electrolytic Capacitors
A. Aluminium Electrolytic Capacitor
Consists of an aluminium-foil electrode which
has an aluminium-oxide film covering on one side.
The aluminium plate serves as the positive plate
and the oxide as the dielectric.
 The oxide is in contact with a paper or gauze
saturated with an electrolyte.
The electrolyte forms the second plate
(negative) of the capacitor.
 Another layer of aluminium without the oxide
coating is also provided for making electrical •Aluminium electrolytic capacitor
contact between one of the terminals and the range from 1uF up to 47,00uF.
electrolyte. •Used in coupling, DC blocking and by-
 In most cases, the negative plate is directly pass circuits.
connected to the metallic container of the •Foil types are better suited as
capacitor. smoothing capacitors (filter) in power
 The container then serves as the negative supplies.
terminal for external connections. Elecltrolytes can be non-solid
borax, solid manganese dioxide
or any conducting polymer.
Electrolytic Capacitor
contd….
B. Tantalum Electrolytic capacitor

Cost: 1uF 63 V - 1Rs.

1uF 230V – Rs. 10
Increases with voltage rating and capacitance value
Electrolytic Capacitor
contd…
 Tantalum pentoxide layer formed on
the anode is highly stable compared to
the aluminium oxide layer in
Aluminium electrolytic capacitor.
 Electrolytes used are sulphuric acid,

lithium chloride, boric acid, manganese

oxide…….
 Teflon – polytetrafluoroethylene

 -has high dielectric constant

and
-high operating temperature
 Extremely thin dielectric film hence
high value of capacitance from 47nF to
10000µF
5a.Polystyrene Capacitor

 It consist of two metal foil separated by a strip of

polystyrene as dielectric.
 They come only in low values, usually 10pF to 47nF.
 They are not suitable for high-frequency applications.
5b.Polyester Capacitor

 Polyester capacitors are considered as standard

for many DC applications wherein the cost is the
main consideration for low tolerance values.
 A Polyester capacitor offer a low tolerance
value, which is equivalent to 5% or 10%.
 These capacitors uses layers of metal and Mylar
dielectric or any polyester in order to make a
wide range of capacitance values.
 A polyester film is placed in between the two
plates of this capacitor.
 These capacitors are available in the range of
1nF to 15uF rated at voltages from 50V –
1500V.
 These capacitors have low temperature
coefficient values and high isolation
resistances.
 Variable Capacitors

Applications
 In radio receivers and transmitters for tuning

 For varying frequency of oscillators

 For tracking and alignment of receivers

 Variable capacitance transducers are used for measurement of speech,

pressure, displacement, vibration, etc.

1. Gang Capacitor

Capacitance may be intentionally and repeatedly changed mechanically.

Variable capacitors are often used in L/C circuits to set the resonance
frequency, or as a variable reactance for impedance matching in antenna
tuners.

Symbol
Gang Capacitor Contd….
The most common variable capacitor is the air-gang capacitor.
The dielectric for this capacitor is air.
It has a set of fixed plates and another set of plates that can be moved with the help
of a shaft
By rotating the shaft, we can change the common area between the movable and
fixed set of plates.
The greater the common area, the larger the capacitance

Gang condensor
2. Trimmers
In some applications, the need for variation
in the capacitance is not frequent. One
setting is sufficient for all normal operations.
In such situations, we use a variable capacitor
called a trimmer. Both mica and ceramic are
used as the dielectric for trimmer capacitors.
These are generally small devices that can be
adjusted or “pre-set” to a particular
capacitance value with the aid of a small
screwdriver and are available in very small
capacitance’s of hundreds of pF or less and
are non-polarized. They are used in
conjunction with large capacitors for fine
adjustments.
3. Padders
It is a trimmer with a high value of capacitance and
air as dielectric.
It consists of two aluminium cups having different
diameters.
One cup is kept stable while the other one inverted
over the first can be adjusted to desired position with
the help of a screw.
The variation of distance between the two cups
varies the capacitance value.
Air works as dielectric between the two cups.

Eg: A variable capacitor inserted in series

with the oscillator tuning circuit of a
superheterodyne receiver to control
calibration at the low-frequency end of a
tuning range in antique radios.
Thank you!!