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The circuit below is known as a Wheatstone bridge, a device popularized by Sir Charles Wheatstone. The purpose of the Wheatstone bridge is to measure some unknown impedance. This is achieved by 'balancing' the two legs of bridge, one will contain a variable resistor and the other the component whose impedance we wish to measure.
Can you find the condition on the variable resistor needed for balance (V = 0) using loop current analysis?
Can you find the condition for balance using a potential divider argument?
Extension:
If we now replace the DC voltage source with an AC voltage source of frequency f, add a capacitor C_3 in series with R_3 and added a second capacitor C_2 in parallel with R_2, at what frequency will balance occur, in terms of R_1,R_2,C_2,R_3,C_3 and R_x?
Bricks are 20cm long and 10cm high. How high could an arch be built without mortar on a flat horizontal surface, to overhang by 1 metre? How big an overhang is it possible to make like this?
Explain why, when moving heavy objects on rollers, the object moves twice as fast as the rollers. Try a similar experiment yourself.
Given the graph of a supply network and the maximum capacity for flow in each section find the maximum flow across the network.