Free Expert Guides on Power Systems, Circuit Design & Electrical Troubleshooting

What is the Time Constant?The time constant – usually denoted by the Greek letter τ (tau) – is used in physics and engineering to characterize the response to a step input of a first-order, linear time-invariant (LTI) control system. The time constant is the main characteristic unit of a first-order LTI system.The time constant is commonly used to characterize the response of an RLC circuit.To do this, let us derive the time constant for an RC circuit, and the time constant for an RL circuit.Tim

What is an RC Circuit?An RC circuit (also known as an RC filter or RC network) stands for a resistor-capacitor circuit. An RC circuit is defined as an electrical circuit composed of the passive circuit components of a resistor (R) and capacitor (C), driven by a voltage source or current source.Due to the presence of a resistor in the ideal form of the circuit, an RC circuit will consume energy, akin to an RL circuit or RLC circuit.This is unlike the ideal form of an LC circuit, which will consum

What is an LC Circuit?An LC circuit (also known as an LC filter or LC network) is defined as an electrical circuit consisting of the passive circuit elements an inductor (L) and a capacitor (C) connected together. It is also called a resonant circuit, tank circuit, or tuned circuit. An LC – Circuit Due to the absence of a resistor in the ideal form of the circuit, an LC circuit consumes no energy. This is unlike the ideal forms of RC circuits, RL circuits, or RLC circuits, which consume ene

What is an Inverting Amplifier?An inverting amplifier (also known as an inverting operational amplifier or an inverting op-amp) is a type of operational amplifier circuit which produces an output which is out of phase with respect to its input by 180o.This means that if the input pulse is positive, then the output pulse will be negative and vice versa. The figure below shows an inverting operational amplifier built by using an op-amp and two resistors.Here we apply the input signal to the invert

Operational amplifier or op amps as they are usually referred are linear devices that can give ideal DC amplification. They are fundamentally voltage amplifying devices used with external feedback components like resistors or capacitors. An op amp is a three terminal device, with one terminal called the inverting input, other the non-inverting input and the last one is the output. Below is a diagram of a typical op amp:As you can see from the diagram, op amp has three terminals for input and out

Differentiator is an op amp based circuit, whose output signal is proportional to differentiation of input signal.An op amp differentiator is basically an inverting amplifier with a capacitor of suitable value at its input terminal. The figure below shows the basic circuit diagram of an op amp differentiator.We will first assume that the op amp used here is an ideal op amp. We know that the voltage at both inverting and non inverting terminals of an ideal op amp is same. As the electric potentia

An op amp is an amplifier. But an op amp can also perform summing operation. We can design an op amp circuit to combine number of input signals and to produce single output as a weighted sum of input signals.Summing amplifier is basically an op amp circuit that can combine numbers of input signal to a single output that is the weighted sum of the applied inputs.The summing Amplifier is one variation of inverting amplifier. In inverting amplifier there is only one voltage signal applied to the in

Non-inverting amplifier is an op-amp-based amplifier with positive voltage gain.A non-inverting operational amplifier or non-inverting op-amp uses an op-amp as the main element.The op amp has two input terminals (pins). One is inverting denoted with a minus sign (-), and other is non-inverting denoted with a positive sign (+).When we apply any signal to the non – inverting input, it does not change its polarity when it gets amplified at the output terminal.So, in that case, the gain of the ampli

What is an Ideal OP Amp?An operational amplifier (OP Amp) is a direct current coupled voltage amplifier. That is, it increases the input voltage that passes through it. The input resistance of an OP amp should be high whereas the output resistance should be low. An OP amp should also have very high open loop gain. In an ideal OP amp, the input resistance and open loop gain is infinity whereas the output resistance is zero.An ideal OP amp has have following characteristics— Characteristic

Negative Feedback in Op AmpWe obtain Negative feedback in an op amp by connecting output terminal of an op amp to its inverting input terminal through a suitable resistance as shown below.The gain of an op amp with negative feedback is called closed loop gain.Closed Loop Gain of Op AmpWhen we connect a feedback resistance and a resistance in series with the inverting input terminal of an op-amp as shown in the above picture, the gain of the system just becomes the negative ratio of feedback resi