Ministry Of Higher Education

Northern Technical University

Technical College /Mosul

Department Of Medical Instruments

Report Of :-

Student Name :-
Abdulrahman Salwan Mahmood

Teacher :-
Ghasan Ahmed Al Qassab

Class 2nd A

Date of Report : - 11 / 6 / 2020 - 19 / 10 / 1441

 Contents

Subject Page No.

Introduction 1

DC Value of a Full-Wave Signal 3

A Second-order Approximation 4

Output Frequency 4

Filtering the Output of a Rectifier 5

CONCLUSION 6

REFERENCES 7
 The Full-Wave Rectifier

Although the half wave rectifier is used in some low power applications such as
signal and peak detector, it is seldom used in power rectification. The most used
rectifier in the power rectification field is the full wave rectifier.

The full wave rectifier is more complex than the half wave rectifier, but it offers
some significant benefits. It uses both half cycles of the sine wave resulting in a DC
output voltage that is higher than that of the half wave rectifier. Another advantage is
that the output has much less ripples, which makes it easier to produce a smooth output
waveform.

Introduction

To rectify both half cycles of a sine wave, the full-wave rectifier uses two
diodes, one for each half of the cycle. It also uses a transformer with a center-tapped
secondary winding.

The full-wave rectifier is like two back-to-back half-wave rectifiers. Following

image shows a Full-wave rectifier circuit.

1
 This circuit’s operation is easily understood one half-cycle at a time.

Consider the first half-cycle, when point A is positive with respect to C. At this
time, D1 is forward biased and D2 is reverse biased. Therefore, only the top half of the
transformer’s secondary winding carries current during this half-cycle. This produces a
positive load voltage across the load resistor.

During the next half-cycle, the source voltage polarity reverses. Now, point B
is positive with respect to C. This time, D2 is forward biased and D1 is reverse biased.
As you can see, only the other half of the transformer’s secondary winding carry
current. This also produces a positive load voltage across the load resistor as before.

2
As a result, the rectified load current flows during both half-cycles due to which we
get Full-wave signal across the load.

DC Value of a Full-Wave Signal

Since the full-wave rectifier produces an output during both half-cycles, it has
twice as many positive cycles as the half-wave signal. As a result the DC or average
value is also twice as much:

The average value of the signal over one cycle is calculated with the below formula:

3
 This equation tells us that the DC value of a full-wave signal is about 63.6% of
the peak value. For example, if the peak voltage of the full-wave signal is 10V, the DC
voltage will be 6.36V

When you measure the full-wave signal with a DC voltmeter, the reading will
equal the average DC value.

A Second-order Approximation

 In reality, we do not get a perfect full-wave voltage across the load resistor.
 Because of the barrier potential, the diode does not turn on until the source
voltage reaches about 0.7V. So, the output voltage is 0.7V lower than the ideal
peak output voltage.

Output Frequency

The full-wave rectifier inverts each negative half cycle, doubling the number of
positive half cycles. Because of this, full-wave output has twice as many cycles as the
input.

Therefore the frequency of the full-wave signal is double the input frequency.

For example, if the line frequency is 60Hz, the output frequency will be 120Hz.

4
Filtering the Output of a Rectifier

The output we get from a full-wave rectifier is a pulsating DC voltage that

increases to a maximum and then decreases to zero.

We do not need this kind of DC voltage. What we need is a steady and constant
DC voltage, free of any voltage variation or ripple, as we get from the battery.

To obtain such a voltage, we need to filter the full-wave signal. One way to do
this is to connect a capacitor, known as a smoothing capacitor, across the load resistor
as shown below.

Initially, the capacitor is uncharged. During the first quarter-cycle, the diode D1
is forward biased, so the capacitor starts charging. The charging continues until the
input reaches its peak value. At this point, the capacitor voltage equals Vp.

After the input voltage reaches its peak, it begins to decrease. As soon as the
input voltage is less than Vp, the voltage across the capacitor exceeds the input voltage
which turns off the diode.

As the diode is off, the capacitor discharges through the load resistor and
supplies the load current, until the next peak is arrived.

When the next peak arrives, the diode D2 conducts briefly and recharges the
capacitor to the peak value.

5
Conclusion

1. Advantages of Full Wave Rectifiers

 Full wave rectifiers have higher rectifying efficiency than half-

wave rectifiers. This means that they convert AC to DC more
efficiently.
 They have low power loss because no voltage signal is wasted in
the rectification process.
 The output voltage of centre-tapped full wave rectifier has lower
ripples than a halfwave rectifiers.
2. Disadvantages of Full Wave Rectifiers

 The centre-tapped rectifier is more expensive than half-wave

rectifier and tends to occupy a lot of space.

6
References

1) CAS, Power Converters for Particle Accelerators, Montreux, 1990,

(CERN 90-07).
2) M.H. Rashid (ed.), Power Electronics Handbook (Academic Press,
2001).
3) B.M. Bird, K.G. King and D.A.G. Pedder, An Introduction to Power
Electronics, second edition (Wiley, Chichester, 1993).
4) J. Schaefer, Rectifier Circuits: Theory and Design (Wiley, 1965).
5) P.C. Sen, Power Electronics (Tata McGraw-Hill, 1988).
6) N. Mohan, T.M. Undeland and W.P. Robbins, Power Electronics
(Wiley, New York, 1989).
7) R.S. Ramshaw, Power Electronics Semiconductor Switches (Chapman
& Hall, London, 1993).
8) B.R. Pelly, Thyristor Phase-Controlled Converters and
Cycloconverters (Wiley, 1971).