ENGINEERING TRIPOS PART IA - 2012/2013

PAPER 3 - ELECTRICAL and INFORMATION ENGINEERING

Linear Circuits and Devices

Leaders: Dr. C. Durkan/Dr. T. Flack

Timing: Weeks 3-8 Michaelmas term and weeks 1-3 Lent term

The course is accompanied by the following examples papers, with an indication of the time period of the lectures, and the timing of the associated examples class:

3/1 issued on 28th Oct, on Lectures 1-4 (29th Oct-11th Nov). Examples class on 25th Nov.

3/2 issued on 11th Nov, on Lectures 5-8 (12th Nov-25th Nov). Examples class on 2nd December.

3/3 issued on 25th Nov, on Lectures 9-12 (lectures 9 & 10 are before Christmas on the 26th of Nov & 2nd of Dec, 11 & 12 are after Christmas, on the 15th and 18th of Jan). Examples class on the 20th Jan.

3/4 issued on 20th Jan on Power lectures. Examples class 3rd Feb.

3/5 issued on 27th Jan, on Lectures 13-18 (20th-27th Jan). Examples class 10th Feb.

Structure: 22 lectures, (18 on linear circuits (CD), 4 on power flow (FU)), 2 lectures/week, in Michaelmas term, 3/ week in Lent term.

AIMS

The aims of the course are to:

• Teach students how electrical and electronic circuits are analysed, how field effect transistors and amplifiers operate, how real and reactive power flows in a.c. circuits, and to teach basic transformer theory.

OBJECTIVES

As specific objectives, at the end of the course students should be able to:

• Know how Ohm's law, the concepts of ideal voltage and current sources, and Thevenin's and Norton's theorems are used by electrical engineers to calculate currents and voltages in d.c. and a.c. circuits. To explain Kirchhoff's voltage and current laws and show how they are applied to the analysis of electrical networks.(Lectures 1-4).
• Know how power is transferred from a source to a load and how any network can be represented by a Thevenin or a Norton source.(Lecture 4).
• Understand how semiconductors can be doped to produce p-type and n-type semiconductors, introduce the p-n junction diode. (Lectures 5 & 6).
• Know the principles of operation of the Field Effect Transistor (FET).(Lectures 6 - 8)
• Use complex numbers in the analysis of a.c. circuits and keep track of amplitude and phase simultaneously. Understand the importance of resonance and resonant frequency in electronic circuits.(Lectures 9-12).
• Know how an equivalent circuit for an FET can be used in transistor circuits to determine the small-signal performance of the circuits.(Lectures 13-14).
• Calculate the gain, frequency response, and input and output impedances of amplifier circuits.(Lectures 15-16).
• Introduction to operational amplifiers (Op Amps), and understand how feedback can be used in amplifier circuits to improve frequency response, gain stability and output and input impedances. (Lectures 17-18).
• Understand the concepts of real, reactive and apparent power, and power factor, the importance of power factor correction of a.c. loads, the principles of operation of the transformer, and the development and use of its equivalent circuit.

SYLLABUS (Book References)

• Mesh and nodal analysis (1) 34 - 39
• Thevenin's and Norton's theorems, superpositions. (1) 50 - 57
• D.C. characteristics of:
• Diodes (1) 340 - 348 (2) 36 - 41
• Field effect transistors (MOSFET) (1) 362 - 367 (2) 62 - 66
• Operating point, load line and graphical analysis of common source amplifier. (1) 556 - 559 (2) 48 52
• Alternating current circuits:
• Techniques, impedance, admittance, phasors, mutual inductance. (1) 151-163 (1) 263- 264
• Circuits containing R,L and C. Resonance. (1) 220-231
• Power in resistive loads, r.m.s. quantities. (1) 79
• Amplifiers as building blocks, decibels, mid-band gain, bandwidth, multistage amplifiers and coupling. (1) 630 - 632 (2) 1 - 22
• Linearised models of F.E.T. (1) 591 - 595 (2) 52 - 54
• Common source amplifier (2) 54 - 60
• Operational amplifiers, characteristics, feedback, inverting and non-inverting configurations. (1) 518 - 53 (2) 114 - 137
• A.C. Power Flow (1) 205-213 (3) 7-12
• Real power (Watts), reactive power (VARs), apparent power, power factor and its correction.
• Use of power and reactive power to solve a.c. circuits.
• Single-phase Transformers (1) 690 - 710 (3) 67-78
• Principles of operation.
• Development and use of transformer equivalent circuit.

REFERENCES

Please see the Booklist for Part IA Courses for module references.

Last updated: May 2012