ES

3: Introduction to Electrical Engineering Systems

Laboratory 4: Noise & Interference

Noise or interference is any unwanted part of a desired signal.

Noise is a random fluctuation in an electrical signal and is normal for all electronic
circuits. There are several sources of electrical noise: thermaloccurs at any non-
zero temperature; shotbeing that current is a flow of discrete charges; and
defectsfrom imperfect materials, variable manufacturing processes, and other
handling and usage.

Electromagnetic interference impacts the performance of an electrical circuit from
an external source by capacitive and inductive effects via electrical and magnetic
fields, respectively. These impacts can interrupt a signal or limit the functionality of
the electronics, or cause data loss in a signal. Sources of interference are man-made
or natural. Typically, the interference is a rapidly changing signal, or a signal that
undergoes a rapid change. For example, a solar flare from the Sun can disrupt
communication signals, causing distortion or total obliteration; the speaker of a
mobile phone has crackling sounds when placed near a laptop computer.

While noise or interference means any unwanted signal affecting the desired signal,
our attention in this lab will be interference. We will not be concerned with random
signals. Our investigation is limited to sound. Sounds, particularly loud ones, that
disturb people or make it difficult to hear wanted sounds, are interference, although
colloquially we refer to it as noise. For example, conversations of people dining at a

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restaurant may be difficult for people with hearing aids. The noise from people at
other tables or dishes banging as servers deliver food orders may prevent them
from participating in the conversation. Any unwanted sound such as the barking of
dogs, neighbors playing loud music, lawn mowers, the revving of a motorcycle or
other road traffic, and a low flying jet aircraft, we call noise. Actually, since these are
not random, they are technically interference.

Acoustic interference can be anything from quiet but annoying to loud and harmful.
At one extreme users of public transport sometimes complain about the faint and
tinny sounds emanating from the headphones or earbuds of a co-traveler listening
to a portable audio player; at the other is the sound of very loud music, a jet engine
at close quarters, an explosion, which can possibly cause permanent irreversible
hearing damage.

Your voiceat conversational tonecan be a disturbance, or in technical terms,
interference. Imagine a musician playing an instrument and you talking, albeit
softly, during a performance. Music is sinusoidal tones in the audio spectrum
arranged in a desired way, and your voice is corrupting the sound. How so? What
does your voice do to the musical signal? What can be done about? In this lab, we
shall explore problems of this type and how engineer resolve them.

1 .0 Goals

The goals of this lab are to construct an electrical circuit that removes unwanted
interference from a desired signal. The desired output signal is a pure sinusoid of
10 kHz. You will be an active part of the lab. Your voice will be the unwanted signal,
that is, your voice combined through an inductive circuit is the interference. You
will measure the unwanted signal and the desired signal on an oscilloscope to verify
that the circuit does indeed remove the unwanted signal.

2.0 Pre-Lab Questions Read the lab first, then answer the
questions. Some answers are not contained in the lab.

1. Provide examples of three applications where a high-pass filter is used to

remove the unwanted frequencies in a system. Do the same for three
applications where low-pass filters would be required.
2. Is the electret microphone a low-pass or high-pass filter? What impact does
this have on this lab? How does it affect the output signal?
3. What is the transformer doing in the circuit? Draw a block diagram to show
its input and output.

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4. What is the difference between a real op-amp and an ideal op-amp? What
sources of error do you need to consider completing this lab successfully?
5. Using a single ideal dependent source draw a circuit schematic of the buffer
amplifier. Which type of dependent source is required? A voltage-controlled
current source; voltage-controlled voltage source; current-controlled current
source; or current-controlled voltage source. Why? What is the gain of the
buffer in decibels (dBs)?
6. What is negative feedback?
7. Assume the frequencies in the visible spectrum making up a white light beam
have equal amplitudes. Imagine the following three experiments:
7.1 A blue filter is a low pass filter for visible light. Assume white light is
incident on a blue filter. What frequencies of light are removed from the
white light when it passes through the blue filter?
7.2 A red filter is a high-pass filter for visible light. Assume white light is
incident on a red filter. What frequencies of light are removed from the
white light when it passes through the blue filter?
7.3 Imagine white light incident on a blue filter, passes through it, and then
the light passes through a red filter? What frequencies remain in the
output signal from the red filter? What happens when the order of the
filters is reversed?
8. What are your expectations about this lab based upon the three thought
experiments?

3.0 Equipment & Materials

A low-pass filter is a filter that passes low-frequency signals and attenuates
frequencies higher than the cutoff frequency. The actual amount of attenuation for
each frequency varies depending on the specific filter design. In audio applications,
the filter may be referred to as a treble cut filter. Low-pass filters average a signal.
They produce a smoother waveform by removing the high frequency variations.

A high-pass filter, on the other hand, allows high-frequency signal to pass through,
while attenuating low frequencies below the cutoff frequency. As in a low-pass
filter, the attenuation or amplification of a specific frequency depends on the
properties of the filter. A high-pass filter is called a bass-cut filter in audio
applications.

You will use several of the lab measurement instruments and electrical components
you are familiar with from preceding labs. This lab introduces the RUN/STOP and
PRINT features of the oscilloscope along with three new components: the
transformer, the electret microphone, and the op-amp.

3. 1 The Oscilloscope

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The RUN/STOP feature of the Tektronix TDS 2012 allows you to acquire data. The
RUN/STOP button is to the right of the Auto Set button on the top-right of the front
panel. See Figure 1.

Figure 1 Run/Stop & Print Features of Tektronix TDS 2012 Oscilloscope

Press the RUN/STOP button when you want the oscilloscope to continuously
acquire waveforms. Push the button again to stop the acquisition. When you press
the RUN/STOP buttons to start an acquisition, the oscilloscope goes through these
steps:
1. Acquires enough data to fill the portion of the waveform record to the left of
the trigger point. This is also called the pre-trigger.
2. The oscilloscope continues to acquire data while waiting for the trigger
condition to occur.
3. Detects the trigger condition.
4. The oscilloscope continues to acquire data until the waveform record is full.
5. Displays the acquired waveform.

While the data acquisition is running, the waveform display is live. When you push
The RUN/STOP button for a second time the data acquisition stops, freezing the
display. The waveform display can be scaled or positioned with the vertical and
horizontal controls.

Printing screen data from the oscilloscope occurs when your press the PRINT
button. The print button is located in the top-middle of the front panel just to the
right of the Tektronix label.

To print the screen data you just captured via the RUN/STOP button, push the
PRINT button. The oscilloscope may take a few seconds to capture the screen data,
as the settings for the device and the print speed of the printer determine the actual
duration. Some additional time may be required according to the format selected.
However, you can use the oscilloscope while the printer prints

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3.2 The Transformer

The Triad TY-141P audio transformer operates in the range of 200 Hz to 15 kHz. See
Figure 2. The device has several uses, three examples are:
Impedance matchingmatching the input impedance of an electrical load or
the output impedance to the source to maximize the power transfer or
minimize signal reflection.
Couplingthe desired or undesired transfer of electrical energy from one
circuit element to anotherif undesired, this is interference.
Isolationto block transmission of the DC signal component from one circuit
to the other, while allowing the AC component of the signal to pass; isolation
transformers typically have a ratio of 1:1 between the primary and
secondary windings.
We will be using the second use.

The specifications for this device are:

Primary Impedance: 10 k
Secondary Impedance: 10 k3.
Output: 100 mW
Frequency Response: 200 to 15 kHz, 2dB
Impedance Matching: 10% over full frequency range
Turns Ratio: 1:1

Figure 2 The Transformer

3.3 The Electret Omni-directional Microphone

An electret microphone uses electrostatic induction. The electret has an embedded
static electric charge that is permanent and stable. This is due in part to the high
resistance and chemical compositions of the material. Electret is the combination of
the words electrostatic and magnet. Gerhard Sessler and James West invented the

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device at Bell Laboratories in 1962 using a Teflon foil. The immediate use was for
small close proximity microphones in telephone handsets.
An electret microphone uses two conducting plates to capture sound waves and
convert them into an electrical signal. Essentially, this is a capacitor microphone.
Electrets require less power due to the positioning of the conducting plate and an
attached insulator: one is fixed while the other is a vibrating diaphragm. A change in
capacitance between the two conducting plates occurs when a sound wave impinges
upon the diaphragm. The change in capacitance generates a voltage on the back
plate, sending an electrical signal to the output. The device is omnidirectional,
meaning sound is captured from all directions. This microphone type is very
popular around the world for its many uses. Typical specifications for this device
are: sensitivity: -44 dB 2.0; impedance 2.2 k @ 1 KHz; frequency range 100 Hz
10 kHz; operating voltage 2 to 10 V; and signal to noise ratio (S/N) less than 55 dB.
An image of the device and the frequency response is shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3 Electret Omni-directional Microphone and Frequency Response Curve

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3.2 The Operational-Amplifier (or Op-Amp)

You have learned about op-amps in lecture. Recall that operational amplifiers (op-
amps) are one of the most widely used electronic devices, finding applications in
consumer, medical, industrial, and scientific electronics. IC op-amps, shown in
Figure 4, typically cost a few cents when purchased in moderate volume for
manufacturing.

Figure 4 A 741 Op-Amp

In our application, an op-amp is a differential amplifier using negative feedback.
The negative feedback is constructed from a capacitor and resistive, or a purely
resistive feedback network. In lecture and homework problems, we have limited
ourselves to ideal op-amps. You used the summing point constraint to analyze op-
amp circuits having negative feedback using a model of ideal op-amps with:

1. Infinite input impedance
2. Infinite gain for the differential signal
3. Zero gain for the common-mode signal
4. Zero output impedance
5. Infinite bandwidth

Although these attributes do not apply for real op-amps, if we use op-amps in their
linear range of operation, the ideal model is reasonable. In the lab you will use the
741 op-amp. Here, we need to keep in mind its limitations. The input impedance for
the 714 op-amp is typically 6M with a 1 M minimum, while the output
impedance is the vicinity of 100. The open loop gain for the 741 is in the range 104
to 106 and is a function of the frequency. The product of the gain and the bandwidth
of a real op-amp is a constant: AO * BW = K, where AO is the open loop gain, BW is
the bandwidth, and K is a constant. When AO = 1, the expression yields the unity-
gain-bandwidth. For the 741, K = 1,000,000. This means the gain is unity when the
bandwidth is 1 Mhz. If the gain were 500, the bandwidth would be reduced to the
audio spectrum of 20 kHz. An abbreviated data sheet is shown in Figure 5.

Since you will be working well within these specifications we can continue to
assume an ideal op-amp for analysis and calculation, realizing that the imperfection
will provide some measurement error that you will need to explain. To make sure
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the op-amp operates well within its linear range design engineers use the following
guidelines:
Keep the peak-to-peak voltage of the input sinusoid signal to well below a
positive or negative magnitude of 15 V. The smaller the peak-to-peak input
voltage the better. [Note: the voltage for your circuit will be using +9 V and
9 V for the power supply rails1.]
Keep the output current below a positive or negative magnitude of 40 mA.
And lastly, keep the input signal frequency well-below 105. [Note: since you
will be working in the audio spectrum (100 to 20 KHz), your circuit operating
point will be much smaller than this upper limit.]

LM 741 IC Pin Outs

General-purpose operational amplifier with overload protection on input and
output, no latch-up2 when the common-mode range is exceeded or oscillations.
Operating range: 0 to 70 C
Input resistance @ 25: 1M (Min), 6 M (typical)
Input voltage @ 25: 12 V (Min), 13 V (typical)
Output voltage swing @ 25: 16 V (Min) RL > 10 k
15 V (Min) RL > 5 k
Output short circuit current @ 25: 10 mA (min,) 25 mA (typ), 35 mA (max)
Common-mode rejection ratio: 80 dB (min)
Power consumption: 80 mW
Bandwidth @ 25: 0.437 MHz (min), 1.5 MHz (typ)

Figure 5 Abbreviated Op-Amp Data Sheet

1 A rail is another name for a voltage regulator. The DC Regulated Power Supply contains circuitry
that converts unregulated AC into a constant DC. When you set the voltage to +9 V and 9 V, you are
setting the rails.
2 Latchup is a short circuit type of condition that may occur in integrated circuit due to the creation of
a low-impedance path from a power supply. This may cause the grouping of parasitic charge that
interrupts the normal functioning of the device or its destruction from excess current. If not
destroyed, power cycling will typically resolve the problem.

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4.0 Eliminating Electrical Noise and Interference

The ability to eliminate electrical noise and interference is essential to an engineer
conducting measurements or a design engineer responsible for any electrical device.
All sensors and transducers are affected by noise and interference, which impacts
the reliability of the data. Electrical noise and interference in medical measurements
could result in an incorrect diagnosis, in a law enforcement application disrupt
emergency communication, or just be inconvenient when a passing thunderstorm
interrupts cable TV programming or access to the Internet.

For this laboratory you will learn how to use filters to separate desired frequencies
from unwanted ones. The desired solution is to produce a 10 kHz pure tone at the
output (vout) in schematic B. Your voice is the disturbance. Your task is to complete
the filter design circuit to eliminate the sinusoidal frequencies in your voice

Figure 6 shows the combination of a pure tone (single frequency sinusoid) on the
left-hand side with a speech signal at the top saying the word Hello. The pure tone
is one cycle of a 10,000 Hz sinusoidal signal. The voice signal at the top has a
bandwidth from 500 Hz to 4800 Hz. The output is a messy sinusoid. Thus, the voice
signal interferes with the pure tone.

Figure 6 Desired and Unwanted Signal Combined

Figure 7 is a picture of an oscilloscope trace output for this lab. The Ch 1 signal
(yellow) is the unwanted combined signal simulated in Figure 6, while the Ch 2
signal (blue) is the recovered desired signal, a pure tone of 10 kHz.

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Figure 7 Scope Image of Desired and Unwanted Signal Combined

The recovery of the 10 kHz pure tone is via a high-pass filter represented by the
green square in Figure 8. A representative frequency spectrum of a high-pass filer is
shown in Figure 9. Recall from class that the low frequencies, those below the half-
power frequencies are attenuated, while those frequencies above the half-power
frequency are amplified (or at least passed through).

Figure 8 Desired Signal Recovered via a Filter

Figure 9 Normalized Frequency Spectrum of a High-pass Filter

Figure 10 A presents the Microphone-FG Circuit Board for Lab. This circuit board is
provided and shown in Figure 11. The functionality of this board description

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follows. A +9 V is supplied from the Regulated DC Power Supply through your

protoboard layout attached via the red wire (red connection). A 500 mV peak-to-
peak 10 KHz sine wave is input from the function generator directly to the circuit
through the jumper pins. The sine wave travels through the secondary of the
transformer. You voice signal enters the circuit by you speaking into the electret
microphone. Your voice signal is in microvolts and is amplified by the LM 386 audio
amplifier to millivolts to match the voltage of the signal generator. The voice signal
then passes through the primary of the transformer where it is combined with the
sinusoid from the function generated creating a corrupted signal with interference.
The combined signal is output to the input of your high-pass filter through the
yellow wire (yellow connection). The black wire (black connection) is attached to
ground on your protoboard.














(A)

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(B)

(C)

Figure 10: (A) Microphone-FG Circuit Board for Lab; (B) Buffer and High-pass
Filter Circuit to be completed by the student (C) Non-inverting Op-Amp
Configuration

4.1 Constructing the Buffer and High Pass Filter

The schematic of the high-pass filter circuit for which you are responsible to
complete the design and build on a protoboard is shown in Figure 10B. The circuit
is a two-stage (or cascaded) amplifier composed of two op-amps with resistors and
capacitors providing the configuration elements.

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Figure 11: Microphone-FG Circuit Board for Lab

The first stage is a buffer amplifier. A buffer amplifier (or just a buffer) is typically
used to match electrical impedance transformation from one part of a circuit to
another. This circuit is a voltage buffer amplifier. The buffer prevents the second
stage from loading down the first stage to eliminate any undesired performance.
The buffer has a voltage gain of 1 and is called a unity gain buffer. The buffer may
also be called a voltage follower because the output voltage follows the input
voltage.

This purpose of an ideal buffer is explained by imagining a Thevenin circuit
voltage source in series with a Thevenin resistance and a load resistance. This is a
simple voltage divider. The voltage across the load is VLoad = VTh *(RL/(RTh+RL). Now
insert the unity gain ideal buffer between the Thevenin resistance and the load.
Since the ideal buffer has infinite input resistance, no voltage division occurs. The
voltage at the input of the ideal buffer is VTh and the voltage at the node between the
output of the ideal buffer and the input to the load resistance is also VTh. The ideal
buffer, if possible, would make the circuit appear to the high-pass filter stage as an
ideal voltage source! For best performance, the resistors R3 and R4 have identical
values.

Now consider the real buffer in Figure 10B. In this real circuit, the current that
flows through R3 then also flows through the feedback resistor R4, and the node in
between is held to a virtual ground. A virtual ground is a node in a circuit that is
held to a constant reference potential, without being connected directly to a
reference potential. The virtual ground looks like zero impedance, not
infinity. Therefore, this circuit is not an ideal buffer in the sense of not loading
whatever is driving it, unless you make R3 arbitrarily large. This real buffer then,
performs an isolation function. Whatever drives the real buffer sees an impedance
of R3, regardless of what is connected to the output of the real buffer. Thus, the
output of the buffer, because of the low output impedance of the op-amp, does look
like a voltage source.
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Consider the non-inverting configuration in Figure 10C, here the input current has
nowhere to go except into the op amp input, and so you get infinite ideal input
impedance. A good exercise is to work out the node equations to realize that this is
the case.

The second stage is the high-pass filter. The value of capacitor C4 is set to 0.001 F.
The half-power frequency for this filter is 10 kHz. A good design rule of thumb for
this filter configuration is to use resistance values greater 10 k and less than 30 k
in a ratio R6/R5 = 1.6. Set R5 = 15 k and R6 = 24 k.

Constructing the Buffer and High Pass Filter
The TAs will provide you with two op-amp ICs and a protoboard. Use the simplified
data sheet to properly make the circuit connections
Assemble the circuit following the schematic using resistor and capacitors from the
supply bins in the lab and cutting the wires to make the connections.
Remember to provide connections to attach the Microphone-FG board as the input
to your protoboard circuit.
Have the Lab TA review your schematic and protoboard circuit before connecting
up the Regulated DC Power Supply, the Function Generator, and the oscilloscope

4.2 The Signal and Interference Measurement

After the Lab TAs approval of your circuit, you are ready to make the instrument
connections and perform the measurements.

The Signal and Interference Measurement Experiment

Part A: Making the Connections
Make the connection to Ground on your protoboard to the COMMON connector on
the Regulated DC Power Supply.
Connect the +9 V and -9 V to your protoboard from the Regulated DC Power Supply.
Note: the red and black banana connectors attach to the red and black connectors on
the power supply, while the red alligator clip attaches to the yellow connector on the
power supply.
Set the Function Generator a sine wave, 500 mV peak-to-peak, with a frequency of
10 kHz.
Verify the waveform on Ch 2 of the oscilloscope.
Print out a copy of the waveform from the oscilloscope.
Connect the Function Generator cable to the Microphone-FG Circuit Board. Make
sure the outer conductor of the Function Generator cable is attached to the Gnd
jumper and the inner conductor is attached to the jumper labeled 10 kHz 0.5v.pp.
Attached the red, black, and yellow wires of the Microphone-FG Board to
appropriate node connections in your circuit constructed on the protoboard.
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Part B: Measurements
Connect the Ch 1 oscilloscope probe to the node labeled v(modulated) in the
schematic in Figure 10B and the probe alligator clip to a ground node. A sinusoidal
waveform is displayed with a yellow trace.
Connect the Ch 2 oscilloscope probe to the node labeled vout in the schematic in
Figure 10B the appropriate node on your circuit board; and connect the probe
alligator clip to a ground node. A sinusoidal waveform is displayed with a blue trace.
This part is tricky, as one person will need to speak into the Electret microphone,
while other takes the measurement on the scope. You will need to be coordinated in
your actions.
Speak normal and clear with your face near the electret microphone on the
Microphone-FG Circuit Board. The waveform on Ch 1 will change, while the waveform
on Ch 2 remains the same. See Figure 7. Print this screen to validate your high-pass
filter.

Part C: Analysis
This experiment is the reverse of what we normally consider interference. Typically,
we have a voice signal and some other signal is interfering with it. Imagine than your
voice signal is the desired signal for the above experiment and the 10kHz signal is the
unwanted signal. What would have to be done differently to eliminate an unwanted
10 kHz signal from a desired human speech signal?
Imagine you are speaking on a mobile phone. The phone has a bandwidth of 100 Hz
to 5000 Hz. During your conversation an irritating sound interferes with your
conversation. Unfortunately, the frequency of this irritating sound is 2500 Hz, right in
the middle of the bandwidth. As a design engineer, how would you eliminate this
irritating signal? Draw the shape of the filter as a function of frequency. Can you think
of another application, other than a mobile phone, where such a filter would apply?
And finally, a filter changes the nature and shape of the signal. Figure 12 shows an
two electrocardiogram (EKG) waverforms. The blue is the orginal and the red is the
processed waveform to remove noise and interference. Taking into account what you
observed on the oscilloscope for your high-pass filter and the conclusions you draw
from the affected EKG waveform, list four sources of error in your experiment. Explain
your sources of error and recommend how to minimize error.

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Figure 12: An EKG Waveform Affected by a Filter

5. 0 Laboratory Report

All required data, questions, and written comments can be found within the framed
text blocks. In your report, tabulate or plot all of the requested data and answer the
questions in a manner that flows naturally.

Lab report guidelines are listed in the trunk course website in the file ES3 Lab
Report Assignments.docx.

6.0 Equipment and Parts List

Equipment
Regulated DC Power Supply, Model 3010, by RSR Electronics
Tektronix TDS 2012 Oscilloscope
Instek GFG-8250A Function Generator

Parts
LM 741 Op-Amp
Resistors: 15k, 24k
Capacitor: 0.001 F
Microphone-FG Circuit Board with:
TY-141P audio transformer (Digi-key P/N 423-1023)
EMKAY MD9745APZ-F (Digi-key P/N 237-1118)

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