High pass filter with given attenuation

capacitorfilterresistors

Choose a frequency \$f_0\$.We have to project a circuit such as:

  1. all the \$f \ge 10f_0\$ can pass without attenuation
  2. all the \$f \le \frac{1}{10} f_0\$ pass with an attenuation of a factor of 10.

The solution is giving by

schematic

simulate this circuit – Schematic created using CircuitLab

but I can't understand why. Could you help me?

Best Answer

In this instance, think of the capacitor as a frequency-dependent resistor.

At high frequencies, you can think of it as a dead short relative to the fixed resistance. In that case, the input is simply connected to the output, so the gain is 1.

At low frequencies, the capacitor is a open circuit. Now you only have the two resistors forming a voltage divider with a gain of 1/11. Whoever said this had a low frequency gain of 1/10 was wrong, unless they consider 1/11 within their error margin. Note that the gain of the voltage divider is:

  gain = R / (10R + R) = R / 11R = 1/11

To find the crossover frequency of a R-C filter, you set the impedance magnitude of the capacitor equal to the resistance:

  R = 1 / (2πfC)

When f is in units of Hz, C in Farads, then R is in Ohms.