Question

Suppose you need a capacitor bank with a total capacitance of 0.750-mF but you have only 1.50-mF capacitors at your disposal. What is the smallest number of capacitors you could connect together to achieve your goal, and how would you connect them?

Answer 1

Explanation & Answer

• The required capacitance is half of the capacitance of a single capacitor.
• So, simply you can connect a minimum of 2 capacitors in series to get the capacitance halved.
• This is because when capacitors are connected in series, the net capacitance is reduced.

$\qquad\qquad \begin{aligned} \small \frac{1}{C_{net}}&=\small \frac{1}{1.50}+\frac{1}{1.50}\\ \small C_{net} &=\small \frac{1.50}{2}\\ &=\small 0.750\,mF \end{aligned}$