Day 15 Lab 04/23/14

Capacitance:

In this lab experiment we used an experiment to find the relationships capacitance has in order for it to have a proper value for example area and distance between each plate. By placing sheets in between pages of a book we were able to tell how the distance can either change the values or the stay same as well as the surface area of the sheets used to complete the calculation. After obtaining the values using a graph can place an image to the relationships between the distance of the plate and the capacitance. As a result knowing capacitance, we can place capacitors in a circuit along with resistors.

This is the lab experiment of finding the capacitance by using the equipment in the image and by applying the area of the sheets made and the number of pages (distance) to calculate the capacitance of the system.

These are the values obtained by doing the experiment of the image above and finding the relationship of the different variables that can affect the capacitance.

These are the same values of the image above but placed on excel to make it more readable but also to make a graph to view the relationship between the variables of the capacitance. By using excel it made the calculations easier and can make adding new values easier to be place in the calculations.

This is the graph made by the values and it shows that our graph is incorrect compared to the actual graph image in which it should of been vice versa. The reason we believe for making a wrong graph is because we recorded the wrong values or not placing the sheets in the appropriate amount of sheets. But we mostly believed that our multimeter was giving off readings because most of the time the number will fluctuate and not give a some what actual reading that will stay but had no time to figure out the problem and fix it to make the graph what it should been, an exponential growth. 

This was just a demonstration of showing how a capacitor can explode by placing more voltage than it can hold or an other thing can blow the capacitor. However it also showed what's inside the capacitor which we saw was paper and foil material in order to conduct charge.

After learning about capacitors and their effects we can now see the effects it has when placed in a circuit along with an energy source and some resistors. After some trials done we saw that capacitors are opposite from the resistors in a circuit when trying to reduce to an equivalent resistance or capacitance. Resistors in a series are added up together and while in parallel the parallels are added in inverse to find the equivalent resistance. However, capacitors store up energy, are the opposite when placed in a series or parallel circuit because when in series the inverse values are added up and in parallel the values are just added up. As a result causes complex circuits to be more of a difficult when trying to find the equivalence to make the circuit more easy to make. 

Like the resistance experiment a day prior we placed capacitors in a circuit which included series and parallel and be calculated before measuring to see if the theory does work. And after we measured the values of the capacitance we saw the vales were the same proving that the way of finding the equivalence is legitimate.  

We were given a capacitance circuit in which we had to find the equivalence to make it easier just like the resistors problem and now by using the new knowledge obtained in the experiment we are able to make the problem easier and be able to make the difference between the resistors and capacitors in a circuit.