Electrical – Full wave rectifier

rectifier

In a full wave rectifier (consisting of 2 diodes), ac is converted into DC. Confusing part is I know how the rectification is done, but still how the input ac current (consisting of both negative and positive currents) is converted into positive DC current????? enter image description here

How this negative current is converted into positive DC current?

Best Answer

That schematic is confusing as it appears that everything is happening simultaneously. Let's look at each half-cycle of the AC supply.

schematic

simulate this circuit – Schematic created using CircuitLab

Figure 1. (a) A centre-tapped full-wave rectifier. (b) Effective circuit when dot-end is positive. (c) Effective circuit when dot-end is negative.

  • The diodes only conduct in the direction of the arrow in the diode symbol.
  • When the dot end of the transform is positive the lower diode is reverse biased, does not conduct and so is effectively out of circuit as shown in Figure 1b.
  • When the dot end of the transform is negative the upper diode is reverse biased, does not conduct and so is effectively out of circuit as shown in Figure 1c.

The end result is that a pulse of current is alternately given by the upper and lower diode on each half-cycle of the AC supply voltage.

schematic

simulate this circuit

Figure 2. Schematic redrawn in same format as that in the question.