EE 97, Sec 1

Fall 2017
Lab 8: AM Radio Receiver
Ahmad Alhadher
Station 6
11/26/2017
Experiment 1

In this experiment, we used both inverting and non-inverting opamp. We measured the VPP and it
was 5V. To calculate the gain, we had to measure first Vout and Vin. Both opamps had a phase of
0. Our swing voltage was 26.7V. We also added a 1Ω resistor and got the maximum current of
28.2mA.

Figure 1: Schematic

OPAMP Vin (V) Vout (V) Gain Phase

Inverting -1.04 2.48 -2.04 0
Non-Inverting 2.12 7.60 3.06 0

Experiment 2
For this experiment, we set up the function generator with Amplitude = 10VPP, Carrier frequency
= 1mHz, Modulation frequency = 500 Hz, Modulation index = 50%. As a result, we noticed that
the horizontal sweep envelopes the AM signal.
Experiment 3
We tested the circuit with the capacitor both opened and closed. We started with the capacitor
open. We calculated the resonant frequency for both open and closed using our measured
capacitance and inductance (measured with the DMM). To calculate the resonant frequency, we
used the equation,
1
𝑓0 = 2𝜋√𝐿𝐶.

For this experiment, we had to test the circuit with the capacitor both closed and opened. First,
we chose the capacitor to be open and then closed. We calculated the resonant frequency in each
situation by using the capacitance and the inductance from the DMM. We used this equation
1
𝑓0 = 2𝜋√𝐿𝐶 to calculate the resonant frequency.

Capacitor (nF) Inductance (uH) Calculated Measured

Resonant Resonant
Frequency Frequency
(kHz) (kHz)
Open 0.396 0.250 505 501
Closed 0.203 0.250 704 697

We noticed that the resonant frequency is the peak frequency. As soon as it passes the peak, the
frequency becomes lower. Therefore, frequencies become higher until it passes the peak and then
it falls. Our measured resonant frequency was very close to the calculated one.

Open Closed
Frequency VP Frequency
(kHz) (mV) (kHz) VP (mV)
470 3.6 750 8.4
530 5.6 730 13.8
480 6.8 720 20.2
520 9 710 34.4
494 19.4 706 44.8
510 21 700 93
498 35.4 697 151
500 37.6 690 71.6
500 52.4 670 17
502 66 650 8.4
Experiment 4
All we did in this experiment is observing the waveform of the AM radio. We set up the radio as
shown in the schematic below. After building the circuit, we turned on our stereos to max
volume and turned the variable capacitor. We only got 1 station out of it.

Figure 2: Schematic

Summary
We saw that when we have high capacitance, we have less frequency and vice versa. We change
the frequency by manipulating the capacitance. The LC resonant circuit allows us to filter out
various frequencies, and only receive the one that we want.