Capacitors (similar to EK 2F practice test question #25)

[Gauss44]

If you have a circuit with only a battery and a capacitor, the maximum voltage across the capacitor will equal the battery's voltage. A drawing of that description is in the middle picture here: http://www.howstuffworks.com/capacitor1.htm

Now what would happen if you only made one change to this circuit by adding a second capacitor?

1. Say the 2nd capacitor was in series with the 1st capacitor. Or,

2. Say the 2nd capacitor was in parallel with the 1st capacitor.

What would the maximum voltage across each capacitor be?

And again everything else was left exactly the same way (same battery, same wire, etc.)

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[Gauss44]

Anyone?

(I figure I'd give this question one more chance on SDN then turn it over to a tutor.)

 

[sakabato93]

If you have a circuit with only a battery and a capacitor, the maximum voltage across the capacitor will equal the battery's voltage. A drawing of that description is in the middle picture here: http://www.howstuffworks.com/capacitor1.htm

Now what would happen if you only made one change to this circuit by adding a second capacitor?

1. Say the 2nd capacitor was in series with the 1st capacitor. Or,

2. Say the 2nd capacitor was in parallel with the 1st capacitor.

What would the maximum voltage across each capacitor be?

And again everything else was left exactly the same way (same battery, same wire, etc.)

If the capacitors are placed in parallel, the voltage on each capacitor equals the voltage of the battery, but the charges on the plates vary with respect to the capacitance of each capacitor.

If they are in series, the individual voltages are less than the voltage output of the battery, but add up to the output. The individual voltages are weighted in accordance to the capacitance.

Also, these tendencies are true for ideal batteries. For real batteries the voltage output is equal to the emf - Ir where r is internal resistance of the battery and I is current in amperes.

Hope this helps!