Day 19: Second Order Circuits Cont'd

Second Order Circuits Continued

Given the values of the RLC circuit, we were asked to find the current in the system at t > 0. To do this, we needed to find Omega, Alpha, A_1,  and A_2, along with the boundary voltage and currents.

Step Response of a Parallel RLC Circuit

This lab emphasized modeling and testing of a second order circuit containing two resistors, a capacitor, and an inductor. In this assignment, the step response of the given circuit was analyzed and tested. The measured response of the circuit was compared with expectations based on the damping ratio and natural frequency of the circuit.

This is all our pre-lab work. It took a fair amount of time.. We computed our rise time to be .48ms. characteristic equation is shown, complete with variables. Actual values of R, L, and C are shown in the lower left corner. We might expect our actual values to be different from the expected values because we are using real components that have different measures than the posted value.

Here is the circuit we hooked up. Probably one of the cleanest circuits we have ever put together. Looks pretty nice, if I do say so myself.

Given the step function below, this is what we obtained from the oscilloscope.

This is the step function we used to govern our oscilloscope graph above. F = 100Hz. 

When we graphed the circuit on EveryCircuit, this is what we got. As you can see, it is very similar to the graph we got above. This is encouraging, as they should be identical.

Another practice problem on RLC Circuits. The only difference here is that the Current source is not switched out, therefore we have a natural response, and an active response.