Detailed Report on Various Capacitor Types, Construction, and Uses

This report provides a comprehensive overview of capacitors, passive electronic components used to store energy in an electric field. It categorizes capacitors into fixed and variable types, detailing the construction and characteristics of each. Fixed capacitors include paper, plastic, ceramic, and mica capacitors, each employing different dielectric materials and exhibiting unique properties. Paper capacitors use paper as a dielectric, while plastic capacitors utilize plastic film. Ceramic capacitors, commonly used, offer high stability and low loss, with various forms like disc and multilayer types. Mica capacitors, known for precision and reliability, are suitable for high-frequency applications. Variable capacitors, allowing capacitance manipulation, include trimming, tuning, and dielectric types. The report highlights the applications of each capacitor type across various electronic circuits and systems, providing a valuable resource for understanding capacitor technology and its diverse uses in electrical engineering.

CAPACITORS
A passive electronic component used to store the energy in the form of electric field is called as a
capacitor.
The capacitors are broadly classified into two types; they are fixed capacitors and variable
capacitors. This classification is based on, whether the capacitance value is variable or not.
Fixed capacitors:
The value of the capacitance of these types of capacitors is fixed, and cannot be manipulated
once they are manufactured.
Paper capacitors: these capacitors make use of paper as a dielectric material, and are made by
inserting the paper sheets between the aluminium sheets. Paper sheet and metalized paper
capacitors are the types of paper capacitors. Paper sheet capacitors are made by inserting the oil
or wax coated papers between the aluminium sheets. Metalized paper capacitors are made by the
thin layer of zinc or aluminium coated paper. The size of paper sheet capacitor is more compared
to that of metalized sheet capacitor. Paper capacitors usually range in value from about 300pF to
4μF.
Plastic capacitors: plastic film is used as dielectric material in case of plastic capacitors. Film
foil and metalized film capacitors are the types of plastic capacitors. Film foil capacitors are
made of two plastic films arranged between thin aluminium metal foil or sheet. Instead of the
aluminium sheets, a layer of metal vacuum deposition is used in case of metalized film
capacitors. Aluminium or zinc metal layers are most commonly used. These plastic capacitors
are used in A/D converters, motor run, filters, and peak voltage detectors. Capacitance range is
from 100pF to 10μF.
Ceramic capacitors: one of the most commonly used capacitor. As the name indicates, ceramic
materials are used as dielectric between the conductive metals. These are highly stable with low
loss and high capacitance. These capacitors are available in different shapes. These capacitors
are classified into class 1 ceramic capacitors and class 2 ceramic capacitors. Class 1 ceramic
capacitors possess low losses and high stability, where as in case of class 2 ceramic capacitors,
these possess high volumetric efficiency for bypass and the coupling applications. And even,
these capacitors are available in different shapes like, the disc capacitors, tabular capacitors and
the multilayer ceramic capacitors. Ceramic disc capacitors are made up of silver coated ceramic
discs, and the disc acts as the dielectric. These disc capacitors can be used as both low and high
capacitance capacitors based on the number of ceramic discs being used respectively. The tabular
capacitors are hollow cylindrical ceramic material coated with silver ink. As the names specifies,
the multilayer ceramic capacitors are made up of multiple layers of ceramic material and the
conductive electrodes arranged one above the other. In case of these types of ceramic capacitors,
the conductive electrodes are placed between each layer of ceramic material. These types of

capacitors are mainly used in volume control, RF bypass, antenna coupling, tone compensation,
lighting ballasts, resonant circuit, automatic volume control filtering. The capacitance range is
from 10pF to 100μF and the voltage rating is from 16V to 15kV and more.
Mica capacitors: mica material is used as the dielectric between metal sheets in these types of
capacitors. These are highly reliable and precision capacitors. These capacitors have wide range
of voltages, and have low capacitance change over the time and are highly accurate. These
capacitors are capable of working at high frequencies. The stacked mica capacitors and the
silvered mica capacitors are the types of mica capacitors. The metal sheets of copper or
aluminum are used as the dielectric in stacked mica capacitors, and in case of silvered mica
capacitors, the silver is used as the dielectric. These capacitors are highly stable, accurate,
withstand high voltages, and operate at high temperature. These are applicable in RADAR,
LASER, space, filters, resonance circuits, and coupling circuits. The maximum capacitance value
of mica capacitors is 1μF. In case of silver mica capacitors, the ranges from 100 to 1000 volts.
Variable capacitors:
The capacitance value can be manipulated in case of these types of capacitors. The capacitance
value can be varied using LC circuit. Capacitance range is very high, as the capacitance value
can be manipulated. The trimming, tuning and the dielectric capacitors are the types of variable
capacitors. The trimming capacitors are generally used to set the initial values of latencies, rise
and fall times, and oscillator frequency values. The minimum capacitance range is from 0.5pF to
10pF and the maximum capacitance range is from 1pF to 120pF.
References:
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https://www.electronics-tutorials.ws/capacitor/cap_2.html
Poole, I. (2019, March 28). Capacitor Types - descriptions of the differnet types of capacitor.
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capacitor-types.php
EngineersGarage. (n.d.). Capacitor : Types of Capacitors. Retrieved from
https://www.engineersgarage.com/tutorials/capacitors-introduction-types-applications
Capacitor Types | Different Types of Capacitors & Their Characteristics. (n.d.). Retrieved from
https://www.mtiinstruments.com/knowledge-center/types-of-capacitors/.