LINEAR CIRCUIT ANALYSIS

EN-115 L

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END SEMESTER PROJECT REPORT

PROJECT TITLE:
VARIABLE DC POWER SUPPLY
SUBMITTED TO:
ENGR. MISBAH YOUNIS
SUBMITTED BY:
• MUHAMMAD TALAL 19-ENC-03
• MOIZ AHMED WARIS 19-ENC-26

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Table of Contents

• COMPONENTS USED: ................................................................................................... 3

• DC Power Supply Schematic Diagram: .......................................................................... 3
• WORKING (COMPONENT WISE): ............................................................................. 3
Transformer: ............................................................................................................................... 3
Full wave rectifier: ...................................................................................................................... 4
Smoothing capacitors: ................................................................................................................. 4
Lm-317 voltage regulator: .......................................................................................................... 5
Heat sinks .................................................................................................................................... 5
• WORKING (Summary): .................................................................................................. 6
• Trouble-Shooting: ............................................................................................................. 6
• Result: ................................................................................................................................ 7

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COMPONENTS USED:

1. Transformer 220V to 12V (RMS)

2. 4x 1N4007 diodes
3. LM317 Voltage Regulator
4. Heat Sink
5. 2200μF electrolytic capacitor
6. 100μF electrolytic capacitor
7. 220Ω Resistor
8. 50KΩ Potentiometer

DC Power Supply Schematic Diagram:

Fig.1

WORKING (COMPONENT WISE):

We'll now go over each part of this circuit and go over the role each component plays, so that
you can know how this circuit works in its entirety.

Transformer:
The transformer’s job is to take the 220v ac voltage from the mains line and step it down to 12
volts rms. This is because our dc power supply will supply variable dc voltage of 1.25V-17V dc.
Therefore, we lower the very high voltage that we get from the mains outlet from the wall into a
smaller voltage. It must still exceed the voltage of the dc which we want to output. Since we

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want to create up to 17V DC variable voltage output, we need a transformer that converts the
mains voltage to a voltage near this 17V. A step-down transformer is a great device for lowering
voltage from a mains ac voltage line.

Full wave rectifier:

the next component we need in our circuit is a full-wave rectifier. The job of the full-wave
rectifier is to take the AC voltage from the transformer and rectify it so that the voltage no longer
goes through a negative cycle. It uses four 1N4007 diodes. With the rectifier, all of the voltage is
rectified positive.
Below is the how the voltage looks before and after the full-wave rectifier:

You can see how all voltage waveforms are now above the positive line. This is called pulsating
DC voltage. We will later add more components so that this can be a nearly perfectly smooth DC
output, which is what is desired.

Smoothing capacitors:
The next component after the full-wave rectifier is the smoothing capacitor. The smoothing
capacitor acts to smooth out fluctuations in a signal, so that there is less fluctuation. As you saw
in the previous component, the rectifier creates pulsating dc signals. The smoothing capacitor,
now, a 2200μf capacitor, acts to even out this pulsating fluctuation to create a smoother
waveform.
The diagram below shows how the voltage waveform looks before and after the smoothing
capacitor:

An other 100micro farad polar capacitor at the output terminals also acts in the same way and
further smooths the ripples if any present in the output signal.

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Lm-317 voltage regulator:
After the smoothing capacitors is the LM317T voltage regulator. The LM317 voltage regulator is
a 3-terminal adjustable voltage regulator which can supply an output voltage adjustable from
1.2V to 37V. It can supply more than 1.5A of load current to a load.
This regulator serves a twofold purpose. First, it serves to further smooth out the fluctuating
signal, so that it's a perfectly smoothing DC signal.
A regulator is a device that "regulates" voltage so that a perfectly smoothing dc voltage is output.
Below is a diagram of a voltage waveform after both a smoothing capacitor and a voltage
regulator:

The second purpose of the LM317 regulator, since it is an adjustable voltage regulator, is to
produce variable dc voltage as output. How we vary voltage is by changing the resistor R1 and
the potentiometer R2.
these two used together decide what voltage will be output by the regulator. The formula is:
Vout= 1.25v (1 + R2/R1).
so, if R2 is turned all the way so that its resistance is near 0Ω, the voltage output will be just
over 1V. When the potentiometer is turned so that its resistance is 5k Ω, the voltage output will
be about 17 V. This potentiometer decides how much voltage is output, just like how you turn
the knob of a professional-made dc power supply. If we chose a higher voltage-valued step-down
transformer, such as a 36V step-down transformer and used a higher-valued potentiometer, we
could increase the amount of dc voltage output, from, say, 20V to 30V or more.

Heat sinks
One thing we must do to the voltage regulator is attach a heat sink to it. This is vital for this
application.
This is because when we use a regulator, we input a voltage into it and it outputs the voltage,
based on the values of resistor R1 and potentiometer R2. When the potentiometer is at its highest
resistance, it doesn't dissipate that much heat. Since our transformer outputs 12V(rms) or 17.3
Vpeak , when the potentiometer is set to 5k Ω, the regulator outputs 17V. 17.3-17V=.3V. Thus,
not that much wasted voltage is created. However, if the potentiometer is set to near 0 Ω, the
regulator outputs approximately 1.25V. 17.3V-1.25V=16V of wasted, dissipated energy. This
creates a lot of heat, since the voltage difference between input and output voltage is so great.
Any difference appears as heat. So, the greater the difference, the greater the heat. This is the

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reason it is vital to attach a heat sink to the regulator. When the difference between input and
output voltage is great, it appears as heat. We must have a way to dissipate this heat, or else it
can damage or destroy the circuitry of the power supply. The way to do this is to use a heat sink.
This is the reason why professional dc power supplies always have large heat sinks in the back of
them.

WORKING (Summary):

In this project our objective to converts 220V AC to 1.5V-17V DC i.e. we want a variable DC
voltage at the output ranging from 1.5V to 17V. The whole process is divided into different
steps. First of all, the step-down transformer converts the 220V AC to 12V AC. After that a full
wave rectifier circuit converts 12V(rms) AC to 17.3V DC however the DC signal is still
pulsating and is called pulsating DC. Now a 2200 micro farad polar capacitor called smoothing
capacitor smooths the pulsating DC to much extent. Now the LM317T voltage regulator acts in
two ways firstly it further smooths the pulsating DC and also regulates the voltage i.e. provides
us with variable DC voltage ranging from 1.5V to 17V DC. In this process the voltage regulator
gets heated for the removal of which heat sink is used. Finally, another 100 micro farad polar
capacitor further smooths our output signal and removes any ripples if any present at the output
DC signal.

Trouble-Shooting:
It caused me a lot of trouble shooting in this project. First of all, soon after the assembly of the
power supply on breadboard I successfully tested it on 12V(rms) output of my center tapped
step-down transformer. After that when I checked it on 24V(rms) output of the center tapped
step-down transformer the 10k potentiometer got burned. I changed the potentiometer and the
new potentiometer also got burned. Now I used a 50K potentiometer this time it still got burned.
After re analyzing the circuit again and again and troubleshooting It occurred to me that the
voltage regulator has been damaged. Hence I changed the old regulator with new one however
for safety purposes I limited its working to 12V(rm),

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Result:
We were successful to make a fully functioning DC Variable Power Supply with its output
voltage rating from 1.25V to 17V DC.