4.
6 Oscillators – Barkhaunsen's criteria for oscillation
An oscillator is a circuit that produces a periodic waveform on its output with only the dc
supply voltage as an input. A repetitive input signal is not required except to synchronize
oscillations in some applications. The output voltage can be either sinusoidal or
nonsinusoidal, depending on the type of oscillator. Two major classifications for oscillators
are feedback oscillators and relaxation oscillators.
Principles of Oscillator
With exception such as relaxation oscillator, the operation of oscillator is based on principle of positive
feedback where portion of the output signal is feedback into input without phase change. Thus, it
reinforces the input and sustains the continuous sinusoidal output. Beside this, the phase shift of feedback
signal must be either 0o or 360o. The last requirement is the loop gain T of amplifier must be equal to one,
which is also named as Barkhausen criterion. Thus mathematically, the loop gain T is
T =AVb = 1
Conditions for Oscillation
Two conditions, illustrated in Figure 4, are required for a sustained state of oscillation:
1. The phase shift around the feedback loop must be effectively
2. The voltage gain, Acl, around the closed feedback loop (loop gain) must equal 1 (unity).
The voltage gain around the closed feedback loop, is the product of the amplifier gain, and
the attenuation, B, of the feedback circuit. If a sinusoidal wave is the desired output, a loop
gain greater than 1 will rapidly cause the output to saturate at both peaks of the waveform,
producing unacceptable distortion. To avoid this, some form of gain control must be used to
keep the loop gain at exactly 1 once oscillations have started. For example, if the attenuation
of the feedback circuit is 0.01, the amplifier must have a gain of exactly 100 to overcome this
attenuation and not create unacceptable distortion An amplifier gain of greater than 100 will
cause the oscillator to limit both peaks of the waveform.
Figure 4: General conditions to sustain oscillation.
4.7 RC Phase Shift oscillator, Wien Bridge oscillator
RC Phase Shift oscillator
Three types of feedback oscillators that use RC circuits to produce sinusoidal outputs are the Wien-bridge
oscillator, the phase-shift oscillator, and the twin-T oscillator. Generally, RC feedback oscillators are used
for frequencies up to about 1 MHz. The Wien-bridge is by far the most widely used type of RC feedback
oscillator for this range of frequencies.
Wien-Bridge Oscillator
Wien-Bridge oscillator is an oscillator that meets the principle of oscillator. Its circuit is shown in Figure 5
.
Figure 5 : Wien-Bridge Oscillator
There is a lead-lag RC network whereby C1 and R3 leads and R4 and C2 lags. Reactance C of 1
capacitance C1 is significantly affecting the VIN+ at low frequency, whilst reactance C of 2
capacitor C2 equal to 1/jC2 is significant affecting at high frequency. If C1 = C2 and R4 = R3,
there will be no phase-shift because the phase lead is compensated by phase lag. From the
analysis of the circuit, the portion of the output feedback to input
4.8 IC 555 Timer and Astable Oscillator using IC 555
The 555 Timer IC can be connected either in its Monostable mode thereby producing a
precision timer of a fixed time duration, or in its Bistable mode to produce a flip-flop type
switching action. But we can also connect the 555 timer IC in an Astable mode to produce a
very stable 555 Oscillator circuit for generating highly accurate free running waveforms
whose output frequency can be adjusted by means of an externally connected RC tank circuit
consisting of just two resistors and a capacitor.
The 555 Oscillator is another type of relaxation oscillator for generating stabilized square
wave output waveforms of either a fixed frequency of up to 500kHz or of varying duty cycles
from 50 to 100%. In the previous 555 Timer tutorial we saw that the Monostable circuit
produces a single output one-shot pulse when triggered on its pin 2 trigger input.
Whereas the 555 monostable circuit stopped after a preset time waiting for the next trigger
pulse to start over again, in order to get the 555 Oscillator to operate as an astable
multivibrator it is necessary to continuously re-trigger the 555 IC after each and every timing
cycle.
This re-triggering is basically achieved by connecting the trigger input (pin 2) and
the threshold input (pin 6) together, thereby allowing the device to act as an astable oscillator.
Then the 555 Oscillator has no stable states as it continuously switches from one state to the
other. Also the single timing resistor of the previous monostable multivibrator circuit has
been split into two separate resistors, R1 and R2 with their junction connected to
the discharge input (pin 7) as shown below.
Basic Astable 555 Oscillator Circuit
In the 555 Oscillator circuit above, pin 2 and pin 6 are connected together allowing the
circuit to re-trigger itself on each and every cycle allowing it to operate as a free running
oscillator. During each cycle capacitor, C charges up through both timing
resistors, R1 and R2 but discharges itself only through resistor, R2 as the other side of R2 is
connected to the discharge terminal, pin 7.
Then the capacitor charges up to 2/3Vcc (the upper comparator limit) which is determined by
the 0.693(R1+R2)C combination and discharges itself down to 1/3Vcc (the lower comparator
limit) determined by the 0.693(R2*C) combination. This results in an output waveform
whose voltage level is approximately equal to Vcc – 1.5V and whose output “ON” and
“OFF” time periods are determined by the capacitor and resistors combinations. The
individual times required to complete one charge and discharge cycle of the output is
therefore given as:
Astable 555 Oscillator Charge and Discharge Times
Where, R is in Ω and C in Farads.
When connected as an astable multivibrator, the output from the 555 Oscillator will continue
indefinitely charging and discharging between 2/3Vcc and 1/3Vcc until the power supply is
removed. As with the monostable multivibrator these charge and discharge times and
therefore the frequency are independent on the supply voltage.
The duration of one full timing cycle is therefore equal to the sum of the two individual times
that the capacitor charges and discharges added together and is given as:
555 Oscillator Cycle Time
The output frequency of oscillations can be found by inverting the equation above for the
total cycle time giving a final equation for the output frequency of an Astable 555 Oscillator
as:
555 Oscillator Frequency Equation
By altering the time constant of just one of the RC combinations, the Duty Cycle better
known as the “Mark-to-Space” ratio of the output waveform can be accurately set and is
given as the ratio of resistor R2 to resistor R1. The Duty Cycle for the 555 Oscillator, which
is the ratio of the “ON” time divided by the “OFF” time is given by:
555 Oscillator Duty Cycle
The duty cycle has no units as it is a ratio but can be expressed as a percentage ( % ). If both
timing resistors, R1 and R2 are equal in value, then the output duty cycle will be 2:1 that is,
66% ON time and 33% OFF time with respect to the period.
555 Oscillator Example No1
An Astable 555 Oscillator is constructed using the following components, R1 = 1kΩ, R2 =
2kΩ and capacitor C = 10uF. Calculate the output frequency from the 555 oscillator and the
duty cycle of the output waveform.
t1 – capacitor charge “ON” time is calculated as:
t2 – capacitor discharge “OFF” time is calculated as:
Total periodic time ( T ) is therefore calculated as:
The output frequency, ƒ is therefore given as:
Giving a duty cycle value of:
As the timing capacitor, C charges through resistors R1 and R2 but only discharges through
resistor R2 the output duty cycle can be varied between 50 and 100% by changing the value
of resistor R2. By decreasing the value of R2 the duty cycle increases towards 100% and by
increasing R2 the duty cycle reduces towards 50%. If resistor, R2 is very large relative to
resistor R1 the output frequency of the 555 astable circuit will determined by R2 x C only.
The problem with this basic astable 555 oscillator configuration is that the duty cycle, the
“mark to-space” ratio will never go below 50% as the presence of resistor R2 prevents this. In
other words we cannot make the outputs “ON” time shorter than the “OFF” time, as (R1 +
R2)C will always be greater than the value of R1 x C. One way to overcome this problem is
to connect a signal bypassing diode in parallel with resistor R2 as shown below.
50% Duty Cycle Astable Oscillator
The 555 oscillator now produces a 50% duty cycle as the timing capacitor, C1 is now
charging and discharging through the same resistor, R2 rather than discharging through the
timers discharge pin 7 as before. When the output from the 555 oscillator is HIGH, the
capacitor charges up through R2 and when the output is LOW, it discharges through R2.
Resistor R1 is used to ensure that the capacitor charges up fully to the same value as the
supply voltage.
However, as the capacitor charges and discharges through the same resistor, the above
equation for the output frequency of oscillations has to be modified a little to reflect this
circuit change. Then the new equation for the 50% Astable 555 Oscillator is given as:
50% Duty Cycle Frequency Equation
Note that resistor R1 needs to be sufficiently high enough to ensure it does not interfere with
the charging of the capacitor to produce the required 50% duty cycle. Also changing the
value of the timing capacitor, C1 changes the oscillation frequency of the astable circuit.