Physics Department

Faculty of Science
Universiti Teknologi Malaysia

FSPP0034 PHYSICS I TUTORIAL 2

Chapter 2-4

1. To make a 0.40 µF capacitor, what area must the plates have if they are to be separated
by a 2.8 mm air gap ?
[Ans: 130 m2]

2. An electric field of 4.80 x 105 V/m is desired between two parallel plates, each of area
21.0 cm2 and separated by 0.25 cm of air. What charge must be on each plate?

[Ans: 8.92 x 10-9 C]

3. Suppose in Fig.1 that C1=C2=C3 = 16.0 µF and C4=28.5 µF.
If the charge on C2 is 12.4 µC, determine :
(i) the charge on each of the capacitors
(ii) the voltage Vab
[Ans: Q1=Q2=12.4 µC; Q3=24.8 µC; Q4=37.2 µC
V1=V2=0.775 V; V3= 1.55 V ;V4=1.31 V; Vab=2.86 V]

Figure 1

4. What is the capacitance of two square parallel plates 4.2 cm on a side that are separated
by 1.8 mm of paraffin? [Ans:1.9 x 10-11 F]

5. What is the diameter of a 1.00 m length of tungsten wire whose resistance is 0.32 Ω?
[Ans:4.7 x 10-4 m]

6. How much would you have to raise the temperature of copper wire (originally at 20 ºC)
to increase its resistance by 15 %? [Ans: 22 ºC]

7. A 115 V fish-tank heater is rated at 95 W. Calculate:

(a) the current through the heater when its operating
(b) its resistance
[Ans: (a) 0.83 A , (b) 140 Ω]

8. An ac voltage, whose peak value is 180 V, is across a 380 Ω resistor. What are the peak
and rms currents in the resistor? [Ans: (a) 0.33 A , (b) 0.47 A]

9. The peak value of an alternating current in a 1500 W device is 5.4 A. What is the rms
voltage across it? [Ans: 390 V]

10. A 0.65-mm-diameter copper wire carries a tiny current of 2.3 µA. Estimate:
(a) the electron drift velocity, (b) the current density, and (c) the electric field in the wire.
[Ans: (a) 5.1 x 10-10 ms-1, (b) 6.9 Am-2, (c) 1.2 x 10-17 Vm-1]
Credit: Physics for scientists & Engineers with modern physics – Giancoli

11. Calculate the terminal voltage for a battery with an internal resistance of 0.90 Ω and an
emf of 6.00 V when the battery is connected in series with 81 Ω resistor.
[Ans: (a) 5.93 V ]

12. Determine (a) the equivalent resistance of the circuit shown in Fig. 2,
(b) the voltage across each resistor,
[Ans: (a) 1332 Ω , (b) V960= 8.6 V, V820= V680= 3.4 V]

820Ω 960Ω

Figure 2
13. Calculate the currents in each resistor of Fig.3
[Ans: I120 = I82 = 0.24 A, I64 = 0.15 A, I25 = I110 = 0.092 A]

Figure 3

14. In Fig. 4 the total resistance is 15.0 kΩ and the battery’s emf is 24.0 V. If the time
constant is measured to be 24.0 µs, calculate :
(a) the total capacitance of the circuit and
(b) the time it takes for the voltage across the resistor to reach 16.0 V after the switch
is closed.
[Ans: (a) C= 1.60 x 10-9 F (b) t = 9.73 µs]

Figure 4