Biasing techniques : Bipolar Junction Transistors - Electronics Textbook http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/vol_3/chpt_4/9.

html

In the com m on-em itter section ofthis chapter,w e saw a SPICE analysis w here the output
w aveform resem bled a half-w ave rectified shape:only halfofthe inputw aveform w as
reproduced,w ith the other halfbeing com pletely cutoff.Since our purpose atthattim e w as to
reproduce the entire w aveshape,this constituted a problem .The solution to this problem w as to
add a sm allbias voltage to the am plifier inputso thatthe transistor stayed in active m ode
throughoutthe entire w ave cycle.This addition w as called a bias voltage.

A half-w ave outputis notproblem atic for som e applications.In fact,som e applications m ay
necessitate this very kind ofam plification.Because itis possible to operate an am plifier in m odes
other than full-w ave reproduction and specific applications require differentranges of
reproduction,itis usefulto describe the degree to w hich an am plifier reproduces the input
w aveform by designating itaccording to class.Am plifier class operation is categorized w ith
alphabeticalletters:A,B,C,and AB.

For Class A operation,the entire inputw aveform is faithfully reproduced.Although Ididn't

introduce this conceptback in the com m on-em itter section,this is w hatw e w ere hoping to
attain in our sim ulations.Class A operation can only be obtained w hen the transistor spends its
entire tim e in the active m ode,never reaching either cutoff or saturation.To achieve this,
suffi cientD C bias voltage is usually setatthe levelnecessary to drive the transistor exactly
halfw ay betw een cutoff and saturation.This w ay,the AC inputsignalw illbe perfectly “centered”
betw een the am plifier's high and low signallim itlevels.

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Class A:The am plifier outputis a faithfulreproduction ofthe input.

Class B operation is w hatw e had the firsttim e an AC signalw as applied to the com m on-em itter
am plifier w ith no D C bias voltage.The transistor spenthalfits tim e in active m ode and the other
halfin cutoff w ith the inputvoltage too low (or even ofthe w rong polarity!)to forw ard-bias its
base-em itter junction.

Class B:Bias is such thathalf(180o)ofthe waveform is reproduced.

By itself,an am plifier operating in class B m ode is notvery useful.In m ostcircum stances,the

severe distortion introduced into the w aveshape by elim inating halfofitw ould be unacceptable.
H ow ever,class B operation is a usefulm ode ofbiasing iftw o am plifiers are operated as a
push-pullpair,each am plifier handling only halfofthe w aveform ata tim e:

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Class B push pullam plifier:Each transistor reproduces halfofthe waveform .Com bining the halves
produces a faithfulreproduction ofthe whole wave.

Transistor Q 1 “pushes”(drives the outputvoltage in a positive direction w ith respectto ground),

w hile transistor Q 2 “pulls”the outputvoltage (in a negative direction,tow ard 0 volts w ith respect
to ground).Individually,each ofthese transistors is operating in class B m ode,active only for
one-halfofthe inputw aveform cycle.Together,how ever,both function as a team to produce an
outputw aveform identicalin shape to the inputw aveform .

A decided advantage ofthe class B (push-pull)am plifier design over the class A design is greater
outputpow er capability.W ith a class A design,the transistor dissipates considerable energy in
the form ofheatbecause itnever stops conducting current.Atallpoints in the w ave cycle itis in
the active (conducting)m ode,conducting substantialcurrentand dropping substantialvoltage.
There is substantialpow er dissipated by the transistor throughoutthe cycle.In a class B design,
each transistor spends halfthe tim e in cutoff m ode,w here itdissipates zero pow er (zero current
= zero pow er dissipation).This gives each transistor a tim e to “rest”and coolw hile the other
transistor carries the burden ofthe load.Class A am plifiers are sim pler in design,buttend to be
lim ited to low -pow er signalapplications for the sim ple reason oftransistor heatdissipation.

Another class ofam plifier operation know n as class AB,is som ew here betw een class A and class
B:the transistor spends m ore than 50% butless than 100% ofthe tim e conducting current.

Ifthe inputsignalbias for an am plifier is slightly negative (opposite ofthe bias polarity for class
A operation),the outputw aveform w illbe further “clipped”than itw as w ith class B biasing,
resulting in an operation w here the transistor spends m ostofthe tim e in cutoff m ode:

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Class C:Conduction is for less than a halfcycle (< 180o).

Atfirst,this schem e m ay seem utterly pointless.After all,how usefulcould an am plifier be ifit

clips the w aveform as badly as this? Ifthe outputis used directly w ith no conditioning ofany
kind,itw ould indeed be ofquestionable utility.H ow ever,w ith the application ofa tank circuit
(parallelresonantinductor-capacitor com bination)to the output,the occasionaloutputsurge
produced by the am plifier can setin m otion a higher-frequency oscillation m aintained by the
tank circuit.This m ay be likened to a m achine w here a heavy flyw heelis given an occasional
“kick”to keep itspinning:

Class C am plifier driving a resonantcircuit.

Called class C operation,this schem e also enjoys high pow er effi ciency due to the factthatthe
transistor(s)spend the vastm ajority oftim e in the cutoff m ode,w here they dissipate zero
pow er.The rate ofoutputw aveform decay (decreasing oscillation am plitude betw een “kicks”
from the am plifier)is exaggerated here for the benefitofillustration.Because ofthe tuned tank
circuiton the output,this circuitis usable only for am plifying signals ofdefinite,fixed am plitude.
A class C am plifier m ay used in an FM (frequency m odulation)radio transm itter.H ow ever,the

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class C am plifier m ay notdirectly am plify an AM (am plitude m odulated)signaldue to distortion.

Another kind ofam plifier operation,significantly differentfrom Class A,B,AB,or C,is called
Class D.Itis notobtained by applying a specific m easure ofbias voltage as are the other classes
ofoperation,butrequires a radicalre-design ofthe am plifier circuititself.Itis a little too early in
this chapter to investigate exactly how a class D am plifier is built,butnottoo early to discuss its
basic principle ofoperation.

A class D am plifier reproduces the profile ofthe inputvoltage w aveform by generating a rapidly-
pulsing squarew ave output.The duty cycle ofthis outputw aveform (tim e “on”versus totalcycle
tim e)varies w ith the instantaneous am plitude ofthe inputsignal.The plots in (Figure below
dem onstrate this principle.

Class D am plifier:Inputsignaland unfiltered output.

The greater the instantaneous voltage ofthe inputsignal,the greater the duty cycle ofthe
outputsquarew ave pulse.Ifthere can be any goalstated ofthe class D design,itis to avoid
active-m ode transistor operation.Since the outputtransistor ofa class D am plifier is never in
the active m ode,only cutoff or saturated,there w illbe little heatenergy dissipated by it.This
results in very high pow er effi ciency for the am plifier.O fcourse,the disadvantage ofthis
strategy is the overw helm ing presence ofharm onics on the output.Fortunately,since these
harm onic frequencies are typically m uch greater than the frequency ofthe inputsignal,these

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can be filtered outby a low -pass filter w ith relative ease,resulting in an outputm ore closely
resem bling the originalinputsignalw aveform .Class D technology is typically seen w here
extrem ely high pow er levels and relatively low frequencies are encountered,such as in
industrialinverters (devices converting D C into AC pow er to run m otors and other large devices)
and high-perform ance audio am plifiers.

A term you w illlikely com e across in your studies ofelectronics is som ething called quiescent,
w hich is a m odifier designating the zero inputcondition ofa circuit.Q uiescentcurrent,for
exam ple,is the am ountofcurrentin a circuitw ith zero inputsignalvoltage applied.Bias voltage
in a transistor circuitforces the transistor to operate ata differentlevelofcollector currentw ith
zero inputsignalvoltage than itw ould w ithoutthatbias voltage.Therefore,the am ountofbias
in an am plifier circuitdeterm ines its quiescentvalues.

In a class A am plifier,the quiescentcurrentshould be exactly halfofits saturation value

(halfw ay betw een saturation and cutoff,cutoff by definition being zero).Class B and class C
am plifiers have quiescentcurrentvalues ofzero,since these are supposed to be cutoff w ith no
signalapplied.Class AB am plifiers have very low quiescentcurrentvalues,justabove cutoff.To
illustrate this graphically,a “load line”is som etim es plotted over a transistor's characteristic
curves to illustrate its range ofoperation w hile connected to a load resistance ofspecific value
show n in Figure below .

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Exam ple load line drawn over transistor characteristic curves from Vsupply to saturation current.

A load line is a plotofcollector-to-em itter voltage over a range ofcollector currents.Atthe

low er-rightcorner ofthe load line,voltage is atm axim um and currentis atzero,representing a
condition ofcutoff.Atthe upper-leftcorner ofthe line,voltage is atzero w hile currentis ata
m axim um ,representing a condition ofsaturation.D ots m arking w here the load line intersects
the various transistor curves representrealistic operating conditions for those base currents
given.

Q uiescentoperating conditions m ay be show n on this graph in the form ofa single dotalong
the load line.For a class A am plifier,the quiescentpointw illbe in the m iddle ofthe load line as
in (Figure below .

Q uiescentpoint(dot)for class A.

In this illustration,the quiescentpointhappens to fallon the curve representing a base current

of40 μA.Ifw e w ere to change the load resistance in this circuitto a greater value,itw ould affect
the slope ofthe load line,since a greater load resistance w ould lim itthe m axim um collector
currentatsaturation,butw ould notchange the collector-em itter voltage atcutoff.G raphically,
the resultis a load line w ith a differentupper-leftpointand the sam e low er-rightpointas in
(Figure below )

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Load line resulting from increased load resistance.

N ote how the new load line doesn'tinterceptthe 75 μA curve along its flatportion as before.
This is very im portantto realize because the non-horizontalportion ofa characteristic curve
represents a condition ofsaturation.H aving the load line interceptthe 75 μA curve outside of
the curve's horizontalrange m eans thatthe am plifier w illbe saturated atthatam ountofbase
current.Increasing the load resistor value is w hatcaused the load line to interceptthe 75 μA
curve atthis new point,and itindicates thatsaturation w illoccur ata lesser value ofbase
currentthan before.

W ith the old,low er-value load resistor in the circuit,a base currentof75 μA w ould yield a
proportionalcollector current(base currentm ultiplied by β).In the firstload line graph,a base
currentof75 μA gave a collector currentalm osttw ice w hatw as obtained at40 μA,as the β ratio
w ould predict.H ow ever,collector currentincreases m arginally betw een base currents 75 μA and
40 μA,because the transistor begins to lose suffi cientcollector-em itter voltage to continue to
regulate collector current.

To m aintain linear (no-distortion)operation,transistor am plifiers shouldn'tbe operated at

points w here the transistor w illsaturate;thatis,w here the load line w illnotpotentially fallon
the horizontalportion ofa collector currentcurve.W e'd have to add a few m ore curves to the

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graph in Figure below before w e could telljusthow far w e could “push”this transistor w ith
increased base currents before itsaturates.

M ore base currentcurves shows saturation detail.

Itappears in this graph thatthe highest-currentpointon the load line falling on the straight
portion ofa curve is the pointon the 50 μA curve.This new pointshould be considered the
m axim um allow able inputsignallevelfor class A operation.Also for class A operation,the bias
should be setso thatthe quiescentpointis halfw ay betw een this new m axim um pointand
cutoff show n in Figure below .

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New quiescentpointavoids saturation region.

N ow thatw e know a little m ore aboutthe consequences ofdifferentD C bias voltage levels,itis
tim e to investigate practicalbiasing techniques.So far,I've show n a sm allD C voltage source
(battery)connected in series w ith the AC inputsignalto bias the am plifier for w hatever desired
class ofoperation.In reallife,the connection ofa precisely-calibrated battery to the inputofan
am plifier is sim ply notpractical.Even ifitw ere possible to custom ize a battery to produce just
the rightam ountofvoltage for any given bias requirem ent,thatbattery w ould notrem ain atits
m anufactured voltage indefinitely.O nce itstarted to discharge and its outputvoltage drooped,
the am plifier w ould begin to drifttow ard class B operation.

Take this circuit,illustrated in the com m on-em itter section for a SPICE sim ulation,for instance,
in Figure below .

Im practicalbase battery bias.

That2.3 volt“Vbias”battery w ould notbe practicalto include in a realam plifier circuit.A far m ore
practicalm ethod ofobtaining bias voltage for this am plifier w ould be to develop the necessary
2.3 volts using a voltage divider netw ork connected across the 15 voltbattery.After all,the 15

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voltbattery is already there by necessity,and voltage divider circuits are easy to design and
build.Let's see how this m ightlook in Figure below .

Voltage divider bias.

Ifw e choose a pair ofresistor values for R2 and R3 thatw illproduce 2.3 volts across R3 from a
totalof15 volts (such as 8466 Ω for R2 and 1533 Ω for R3),w e should have our desired value of
2.3 volts betw een base and em itter for biasing w ith no signalinput.The only problem is,this
circuitconfiguration places the AC inputsignalsource directly in parallelw ith R3 ofour voltage
divider.This is notacceptable,as the AC source w illtend to overpow er any D C voltage dropped
across R3.Parallelcom ponents m usthave the sam e voltage,so ifan AC voltage source is directly
connected across one resistor ofa D C voltage divider,the AC source w ill“w in”and there w illbe
no D C bias voltage added to the signal.

O ne w ay to m ake this schem e w ork,although itm ay notbe obvious why itw illw ork,is to place a
coupling capacitor betw een the AC voltage source and the voltage divider as in Figure below .

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Coupling capacitor prevents voltage divider bias from flowing into signalgenerator.

The capacitor form s a high-pass filter betw een the AC source and the D C voltage divider,
passing alm ostallofthe AC signalvoltage on to the transistor w hile blocking allD C voltage from
being shorted through the AC signalsource.This m akes m uch m ore sense ifyou understand the
superposition theorem and how itw orks.According to superposition,any linear,bilateralcircuit
can be analyzed in a piecem ealfashion by only considering one pow er source ata tim e,then
algebraically adding the effects ofallpow er sources to find the finalresult.Ifw e w ere to
separate the capacitor and R2--R3 voltage divider circuitfrom the restofthe am plifier,itm ightbe
easier to understand how this superposition ofAC and D C w ould w ork.

W ith only the AC signalsource in effect,and a capacitor w ith an arbitrarily low im pedance at
signalfrequency,alm ostallthe AC voltage appears across R3:

Due to the coupling capacitor's very low im pedance atthe signalfrequency,itbehaves m uch like a
piece ofwire,thus can be om itted for this step in superposition analysis.

W ith only the D C source in effect,the capacitor appears to be an open circuit,and thus neither it
nor the shorted AC signalsource w illhave any effecton the operation ofthe R2--R3 voltage
divider in Figure below .

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The capacitor appears to be an open circuitas far atthe DC analysis is concerned

Com bining these tw o separate analyses in Figure below ,w e geta superposition of(alm ost)1.5
volts AC and 2.3 volts D C,ready to be connected to the base ofthe transistor.

Com bined AC and DC circuit.

Enough talk --its abouttim e for a SPICE sim ulation ofthe w hole am plifier circuitin Figure below .
W e w illuse a capacitor value of100 μF to obtain an arbitrarily low (0.796 Ω)im pedance at2000
H z:

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voltage divider biasing
vinput 1 0 sin (0 1.5 2000 0 0)
c1 1 5 100u
r1 5 2 1k
r2 4 5 8466
r3 5 0 1533
q1 3 2 0 mod1
rspkr 3 4 8
v1 4 0 dc 15 
.model mod1 npn
.tran 0.02m 0.78m
.plot tran v(1,0) i(v1)
.end

SPICE sim ulation ofvoltage divider bias.

N ote the substantialdistortion in the outputw aveform in Figure above.The sine w ave is being
clipped during m ostofthe inputsignal's negative half-cycle.This tells us the transistor is
entering into cutoff m ode w hen itshouldn't(I'm assum ing a goalofclass A operation as before).
W hy is this? This new biasing technique should give us exactly the sam e am ountofD C bias
voltage as before,right?

W ith the capacitor and R2--R3 resistor netw ork unloaded,itw illprovide exactly 2.3 volts w orth of
D C bias.H ow ever,once w e connectthis netw ork to the transistor,itis no longer unloaded.
Currentdraw n through the base ofthe transistor w illload the voltage divider,thus reducing the
D C bias voltage available for the transistor.U sing the diode currentsource transistor m odelin
Figure below to illustrate,the bias problem becom es evident.

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Diode transistor m odelshows loading ofvoltage divider.

A voltage divider's outputdepends notonly on the size ofits constituentresistors,butalso on

how m uch currentis being divided aw ay from itthrough a load.The base-em itter PN junction of
the transistor is a load thatdecreases the D C voltage dropped across R3,due to the factthatthe
bias currentjoins w ith R3's currentto go through R2,upsetting the divider ratio form erly setby
the resistance values ofR2 and R3.To obtain a D C bias voltage of2.3 volts,the values ofR2
and/or R3 m ustbe adjusted to com pensate for the effectofbase currentloading.To increase the
D C voltage dropped across R3,low er the value ofR2,raise the value ofR3,or both.

voltage divider biasing
vinput 1 0 sin (0 1.5 2000 0 0)
c1 1 5 100u
r1 5 2 1k
r2 4 5 6k  <‐‐‐ R2 decreased to 6 k
r3 5 0 4k  <‐‐‐ R3 increased to 4 k
q1 3 2 0 mod1
rspkr 3 4 8
v1 4 0 dc 15
.model mod1 npn
.tran 0.02m 0.78m
.plot tran v(1,0) i(v1) 
.end 

No distortion ofthe outputafter adjusting R2 and R3.

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The new resistor values of6 kΩ and 4 kΩ (R2 and R3,respectively)in Figure above results in class
A w aveform reproduction,justthe w ay w e w anted.

REVIEW :
Class A operation is an am plifier biased to be in the active m ode throughoutthe entire
w aveform cycle,thus faithfully reproducing the w hole w aveform .
Class B operation is an am plifier biased so thatonly halfofthe inputw aveform gets
reproduced:either the positive halfor the negative half.The transistor spends halfits tim e
in the active m ode and halfits tim e cutoff.Com plem entary pairs oftransistors running in
class B operation are often used to deliver high pow er am plification in audio signal
system s,each transistor ofthe pair handling a separate halfofthe w aveform cycle.Class B
operation delivers better pow er effi ciency than a class A am plifier ofsim ilar outputpow er.
Class AB operation is an am plifier is biased ata pointsom ew here betw een class A and
class B.
Class C is an am plifier biased to am plify only a sm allportion ofthe w aveform .M ostofthe
transistor's tim e is spentin cutoff m ode.In order for there to be a com plete w aveform at
the output,a resonanttank circuitis often used as a “flyw heel”to m aintain oscillations for
a few cycles after each “kick”from the am plifier.Because the transistor is notconducting
m ostofthe tim e,pow er effi ciencies are high for a class C am plifier.
Class D operation requires an advanced circuitdesign,and functions on the principle of
representing instantaneous inputsignalam plitude by the duty cycle ofa high-frequency
squarew ave.The outputtransistor(s)never operate in active m ode,only cutoff and
saturation.Little heatenergy dissipated m akes energy effi ciency high.
D C bias voltage on the inputsignal,necessary for certain classes ofoperation (especially
class A and class C),m ay be obtained through the use ofa voltage divider and coupling
capacitor rather than a battery connected in series w ith the AC signalsource.

H igh Voltage,Pow er,Precision and Low TC Resistors

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