Table of Contents
Capacitors have a couple conductive areas called plates. Those plates are separated by an insulator. A power source can move electrons from one capacitor plate to the other plate thanks to the closeness of the plates creating an electric field.
The plate with reduced electrons can pull on the extra electrons of the other plate. Not enough to hold them there permanently, but enough to help maintain the imbalance until there is a return path.
The plate with less electrons becomes positively charged, while the plate with more electrons becomes negatively charged. The imbalance of charges creates a voltage. That voltage can be used as a signal or brief power source.
Connecting a charged capacitor to load or other return path. will restore the balance of the plates. Once both plates have their normal number of electrons again, ideally there will be no voltage difference. However some capacitors have a memory, where the chemistry can build up some of the voltage again once it is discharged and then disconnected from everything.
Farad:
The unit of capacitance is the Farad. A 1 Farad supercapacitor will have 1 coulomb (very large number) of electrons switch plates for every volt it is charged to. A 10F supercapacitor will store 10 coulombs per volt it is charged to. Whereas a 1,000µF (0.001F) will store 0.001 coulombs of charge per volt.
More will be added to this page!
More will be added to this page!
Links to next topics:
555 timer. I believe will be most fun to learn about next. Page will be created later. Or you can check out
Op amps. Can make all kinds of practical circuits especially when combined. Page will be created later. Or you can check out
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