ECT408-Voltage Divider Report

Rick Phillips

October 25, 2021

1.0 Introduction

The “voltage divider” is a simple circuit is commonly used to give an output voltage less than

that of the voltage source. Using just two resistors in series, the operator can produce an output

voltage just fractions of the input. This smaller output voltage is able to be achieved due to the

input voltage being divided among the resistors in series.

2.0 Objective

The objective of this report is to document the impact different resistors have on the output

voltage when placed in the voltage divider circuit.

3.0 Materials

Testing is performed on a Jameco JE24 Breadboard. Results were recorded using a National

Instruments MyDAQ unit, a multitude of wires, a 330ohm resistor as well as 1000ohm resistor

and a 10,000ohm resistor were also used.

4.0 Methods

4.1 Testing Location

4.1.1 Testing is performed in Kettering Labs at the University of Dayton 300

College Park, Dayton, OH 45469.

4.1.2 All raw data is archived in Rick Phillips’ lab notebook.

4.2 Resistor Testing

4.2.1 Measure voltage outputs.

4.2.2 Place resistors (R1=1000ohm, R2=330ohm), with voltage source and Vout

measurement wires in circuit as shown at the top of image 1 (shown in

References section).
 4.2.3 Run the test once, obtaining one measurement. Then, run the test again

using the N = 100 sample size option. Then again with N = 1000.

4.2.4 Repeat this test replacing R1 with a resistor of 10,000ohm.

5.0 Acceptance Criteria

This test is performed as learning situation, there is no official acceptance criteria.

6.0 References

6.1 Image 1 – taken from Rick Phillips’ lab notebook

7.0 Results

7.1 Circuit involving 330ohm resistor and 1000ohm resistor.

Theoretical voltage output for this circuit was calculated to be 1.24V, the charts below

show how the results from the different trials compare to this.

First trial of N=1 resulted in 1.19573V, the following trial statistics are given in the

following shown here:

The following scatter plots give a visual representation of how the data varied from the

originally calculated value.

Percent change from N1 to N100, N100 to N1000, and N1000 to N10,000 was calculated

as .163, .053 and .0026 respectively.

7.2 Circuit involving 330ohm resistor and 10,000hm resistor.

Theoretical voltage output for this circuit was calculated to be 0.16V, charts below show

how results from the different trials compare to this.

First trial of N=1 resulted in 0.1565V, the following trial statistics are given in the table

shown here:

The following scatter plots give a visual representation of how the data varied from the

originally calculated value.

 Percent change from N1 to N100, N100 to N1000, and N1000 to N10,000 was calculated

as .262, .173 and .038 respectively.

8.0 Deviation from Protocol

Protocol was written after obtaining our experimental data, therefor there was is no

deviation to be documented in the report. There is one typo in the methods section of the

protocol. The method states to run the test once, then run at N=100, then again at

N=1000. This is true however after these actions are performed, the test should be run

once again at N=10000.

9.0 Conclusions

To conclude, the N value used does not seem to make a difference on the accuracy of the

data. The mean, median, range and standard deviation were extremely close across the

board regardless of the N value used. One interesting statistic was that the percent change

among the mean values went down greatly as the N values got larger.
10.0 Attachments

voltage divider 1000ohm.xlsx

voltage divider 10kohm.xlsx