Experiment 1

Logan Taylor

8/30/2018

Objective
The objective of this lab was to become familiar with Multisim circuit simulation and
measurement equipment and how to correctly use diodes.

Diagram
 Fig. 3 Circuit created in Multisim

Equipment List
Oscilloscope: Tektronix DPO 4034 Digital Oscilloscope
Function Generator: Tektronix AFG3022 Dual Channel Function Generator
Power Supply
IN4148 Diode
1k Resistor
Breadboard

Procedure
Simulation

The circuit in Figure 1 was built using the simulation software Multisim. Figure 3 shows the
finished circuit. The oscilloscope was connected to the input and the output across the resistor
and the simulation was run. These waveforms can be found in Figure 4.

Experiment

The circuit in figure 1 was built on a breadboard and a function generator with a sinusoid of 4V
peak to peak was connected as the input. An oscilloscope was connected to the input and the
output across the resistor and these waveforms were observed. The function generator was then
switched with a DC voltage of 1V. The DC current flowing through the resistor was then
measured using a multimeter. The DC voltage was then set to 2V and the current was once again
measured. These measurements can be seen in table 1.
Data
Input Resistor
Voltage Current
1V 0.217 mA
2V 0.671 mA
Table 1

Graphs

Fig. 4 Input and output of simulated circuit

Results
For both the simulation and experiment the output waveform on the oscilloscope had no negative
voltages. The peak of the output waveform was also lower than the input. For the input the peak
was the expected 2V and for the output it was only about 1.4V.

When using a DC voltage input the current through the resistor was much lower than expected.
For a 1V input you would expect a 1mA current but it was measured to be about 0.217mA. This
is about 22% of the expected value. For a 2V input you would expect a 2mA current but it was
only 0.617mA. This is about 31% of the expected value.
Conclusion
The diode used in this experiment was positioned so that is was forward biased. This prevented
the alternating current from producing negative voltages as it was only allowed to move in one
direction. An ideal diode would have zero resistance for the forward bias polarity and infinite
resistance for the reverse bias polarity. However real diodes are not ideal and do not conduct
unless the turn-on voltage is reached. The current will then increase as voltage is increased and
the diode will approach zero resistance. The current was much lower when the DC voltage was
1V because it was very close to the turn-on voltage of 0.6V. Even at 2V the current was not even
half of the ideal value.