Lab 2 Basic Equipment and Components

Objectives
Be familiar with the basic electrical tools and components used for circuits. Confirm the
validity of concepts taught in the lectures.
• Understand voltmeter/ammeter/ohmmeter and use them correctly for measurement
• Read resistor color codes.
• Understand DC power supply and different cables, and use them correctly
• Understand breadboard and make electrical connections correctly
• Translate between circuit schematics and the appearance of hardware

Prelab
Answer these questions in the lab report.
1. What are the voltmeter and ammeter? How about their resistances? Should we use
them in series or parallel connection? What will happen if we connect them in a wrong
way?
2. The formular for Ohm’s law is V=IR. What is the exact meaning of V, I, R used here?
Can we use any voltage or any current from a circuit in this formular?
3. In these two circuits, calculate the currents going through the 1 kΩ resistors. Should
the two current values the same or different? Why?

Voltmeter
Voltage is the potential different between two points. To measure the
voltage across an element using a voltmeter, two cables are needed.
a. Connect the banana plugs into the two ports (“V” and “COM”) in the
multimeter. Usually connect a red cable to “V” and a black cable to
“COM”. If the potential of “V” is higher than “COM”, the measured
voltage value will be positive. If the potential of “V” is lower than
“COM”, the measured voltage value will be negative. It is very
important to understand the polarity!
 b. Set the multimeter to voltmeter to measure DC (direct current) voltage
by pressing the button “V” with two lines.
c. Attach the hook clips across the element. The black clip goes on the
element's more negative lead, and the red clip goes on the more
positive lead.
Note: The meter is in parallel with the element, but in ideal situation
the meter will NOT affect the circuit's behavior because it has a
very high resistance (ideally infinite), so just a very tiny current
(due to ohm’s law) flows through the meter. Measure the internal
resistance with another ohmmeter and show in in the lab report.
d. The number displayed on the meter is the voltage between the clips.

Ohmmeter
To measure the resistance of an element, the machine has a “battery” inside
to provide a voltage to the device, measures the current, and calculates the
resistance using ohm’s law.
a. Connect cable leads the same (“Ω” and “COM”) as for measuring
voltage.
b. Set the function to ohmmeter by pressing the "Ω" button.
c. The element to be measured must be isolated from the rest of the circuit
(otherwise the rest part will affect the resistance measurement and lead
to an incorrect result).
d. Attach the hook clips to the element and read the resistance between the
clips.
e. A meter display of “OL” means “overload”, indicating a value larger
than the range of the meter. Such as “open circuit” or huge/infinite
resistance.

Use another voltmeter to measure the voltage (“battery” inside) that the
ohmmeter can provide to the element, show the result in the report.

Ammeter
To measure the current going through an element, the ammeter should be in
series with the element to make sure they have the same current. The
ammeter will not affect the circuit's behavior because it has a very low
resistance (ideally 0Ω), so there is practically zero voltage drop across it
(due to ohm’s law).
 a. Plug the banana plugs into the two ports (“100 mA” and “COM”, or
“10A” and “COM”) in the multimeter. “100mA” or “10A” is the
measurement range, which you need to evaluate based on your circuits
before making connections. If the actual current exceeds the range you
select, the fuse inside will be burned. This is always important to
consider in real work, because large current is usually the reason to
damage devices. Don’t make short circuit!
b. If you have two separated plugs, the black one goes in “COM” port
and the red one goes in “100 mA” or “10A”. If the current goes into
“100 mA” or “10A”, the measured current will show a positive value.
If the current goes into “COM”, the measure current will show a
negative value. It is important for you to consider the current direction
when connecting the cables!
c. When connecting the cable to the element, make sure the meter and
the element are in series connection. Otherwise, it might burn the fuse!
Usually you need to disconnect one lead of the element from the other
part of the circuit, and connect ammeter in between to ensure series
connection.
d. Set the meter to measure DC (direct current) current by pressing the
button "A" with two lines, and read the measured current value.

Protoboard
A breadboard (or protoboard) is a construction base used to build semi-
permanent prototypes of electronic circuits. Breadboards connect pin to pin
by metal strips inside the breadboard.
To understand how these pinholes are connected inside, use ohmmeter
and jump wires to measure the resistance between two pinholes. If the
2 holes are connected inside by a metal strip, the meter will indicate a
very low resistance (almost 0 Ω, due to the low resistivity of metals).
If the 2 holes are not connected inside, the meter will indicate a very
high resistance (usually “OL”, due to open circuit).
Draw a few lines in different areas on the diagram in your lab report,
between the breadboard holes that are electrically connected.
Resistor
Resistors are NOT manufactured perfectly. Resistors are normally
manufactured to a ±5% or ± 1 % tolerance of the nominal value. 5%
resistors cost just a few cents to buy, but resistors with closer tolerances are
more expensive.
Resistors are color-coded to identify their resistance value in Ohms. Most
resistors in our lab use 4-band color code. In the following 4-band example,
the first color band is BROWN, which represents the number 1 in the table.
The second band is BLACK, which represents the number 0. They are the
first and second significant digits. The third band, the multiplier, is
ORANGE. In the table, ORANGE is number 3. So this third band indicates
103, which is 1000. With this information, the resistance is determined by
taking the first two digits, 1 and 0 (forming “10”) and multiplying by 1000.
Example: 10 X 1000 = 10,000 Ω. The fourth band (GOLD) indicates that
this resistor has a tolerance of ± 5%. Thus, the permissible range for this
resistor is: 9,500 to 10,500 Ω.
Randomly take a resistor and calculator the resistance based on its color
code. Then measure it using ohmmeter. Compare the results in the lab report
to see whether the resistor is within the specified tolerance.

Series and parallel circuits

a. Calculate the current and voltage drop at each resistor

b. Build the circuits in the lab and measure the current and voltage drop at
each resistor
c. Build the circuits using Multisim and measure the current and voltage
drop at each resistor
d. The results from the above three methods should be close, but cannot be
exactly the same. What are the possible reasons for the error?
e. In each circuit, calculate the power provided by the battery, and the power
dissipated at each resistor.

In the lab report, you should at least describe your work clearly, present the
data, interpret/analyze your result (show your understanding), and answer
questions in the lab hand-out.