School of Electrical and Information

Engineering
University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
Electrical Engineering Year 2
ELEN2003: Electric and Magnetic Systems

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Project 2014: Conceptual design of a two capacitor device

transformer via an electric field
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Abstract
A standard transformer is a device in which power is transferred via the interaction of a
magnetic field between to winding. This device is widely known and understood. The proposed
project was to investigate the feasibility of such power transformation using two capacitors.
Furthermore this power was to be transferred via the electric field generated in a primary
capacitor that may be detected in a secondary capacitor in order to step up or step down voltage.
In order to achieve this result, the physics involved in the two parallel plate capacitors was
needed to be investigated. Through this investigation it was found that the electric field
produced between the two plates exists outside of the plates to a certain degree. This fields
intensity was calculated and further research showed that by placing two neutral conductors
within this field produced a polarisation of the neutral plates. This in turn showed to produce a
voltage across the new polarised plates. Three design implementations were presented.
However the one which proved to suit all equations discussed was chosen as the final solution.
After performing these calculations with arbitrary values, it was concluded that this design was
in fact possible and a capacitor transformer that may step down voltage was concluded to be
probable.

Ronen Freeman
386910
13/10/2014

Introduction

A standard transformer is a widely used tool

in order to transfer power between two
circuits, either stepping up or stepping
down the voltage. However the
conventional transformer is rather big and
bulky. Therefore a tasked project was
proposed in which research needed to be
done into the possibility of two capacitors
achieving the same or similar result. An
electric field would be the method of power
transfer rather than the standard
transformers magnetic field. This report
will therefore delve into the necessary
research in order to in fact declare this
device probable or not. Furthermore the
different aspects of physics involved will be
analysed leading to different proposed
design implementations. Lastly the relevant
calculations will be evaluated to finally
come to the conclusion of whether or not
power transformation may in fact be
possible via a capacitor transformer device.

Physics involved

Based on the following properties that have

been proven physically the design
implementations were chosen.

3.1

Electric Field Propagation

The basis of the standard electromagnetic

transformer is that a magnetic flux
produced in the coils of a primary circuit
propagates in concentric circles. This flux
is thus picked up by a secondary coil thus
producing a current within this wire.
Therefore based on this phenomenon
research was done into the propagation of
an electric field produced by a parallel plate
capacitor. The main target was to gather
information to support the fact that this
electric field may exist outside of the plates
as well as inside. As viewed in figure 1 this
was in fact found to be true since the charge
on the outside of the plates, though smaller,
do create their own electric field [1].
Furthermore research into the magnitude of
this field has been done which led to
equation (1) [2]. Therefore leading one step
closer to the desired performance of a
capacitor transformer.

Project Overview

A transformer is a device which transfers

power between two circuits via a magnetic
field generated by electrified windings
wound around a metal core. The tasked
project was to investigate whether this same
result was possible by using two capacitors.
One of these capacitors would act as a
primary device which would produce an
electric field based on the applied voltage.
This electric field would need to transfer
power into the secondary capacitor thus
applying a secondary voltage across its
circuit. Since there exists little or no
information on this subject much research
into the physics of how this device may
operate was needed to be done. It was
possible
that
different
design
implementations would need to be
considered. Furthermore how this new
proposed device may act with similar
characteristics as the conventional
transformer.

(1)

Where:
is the magnitude of the electric field
just outside the plates,
is the magnitude
of the electric field between the plates, is
the distance between the plates and and
W are the dimensions of the plates.

Figure 1: Image showing the electric field lines

outside the parallel plate capacitor

Figure 2: A neutral conductor in an electric

field. The charges within the conductor
rearrange thus polarising the object.

3.2 Neutral Conductor in an

Electric Field

4
Proposed Design
Implementations

Since it was proven that an electric field

will be generated outside the parallel plates,
the next step in reaching a capacitor
transformer will be to prove that a
secondary capacitor may actually be able to
detect this field. If a neutral conductor is
placed in an electric field, the charges
within the conductor will rearrange
themselves according to the direction of the
field. This phenomenon is depicted in
figure 2. Thus if this object were to be the
plates of a secondary conductor, they would
become polarised [3]. Further information
showed that a polarised object has a
potential associated with it which can be
calculated using equation (2) [4].
=

!$

"

#&

There are many ways in which these two

capacitors could possibly be arranged.
However given prior knowledge of how the
standard transformer operates, and the
physics discussed in the previous section,
three different capacitor setups are
proposed. In the figure 3(a), (b) and (c) the
purple plates represent those of the
secondary capacitor. The charges shown in
all the figures represent the alignment of the
charges on the inside of the plates as they
would appear when polarised as a result of
the shown electric field.

4.1

(2)

Design 1

The first design is illustrated in figure 3 (a).

It shows that the secondary capacitor plates
would be place on the outsides of the
primarys plates. What would result is that
the plates of the second capacitor would
become polarised as viewed. Furthermore
from equation (2) a potential will be
developed in both thus creating an overall
potential difference across the capacitor.
When connected in a circuit this potential
should allow a current to flow therefore
creating a different method to transfer
power between circuits.

Where:
V is the potential of the polarised object, '(
is a constant for the vacuum permittivity, )*
is the surface charge density, +* is the
volume charge density.

result of the electric field from the outside

of the closest primary plate. Their electron
orientation can be seen in the figure.
Similarly as a result of this polarisation, a
voltage will be developed across the
terminals. Moreover since less of the
electric field is interacting with this second
capacitor, the terminal voltage would in fact
be smaller.
(a)

4.3

Design 3

Figure 3 (c) shows the last chosen design.

As in the above designs the secondary
plates will be polarised. Furthermore it is
again noticeable how the second plates are
not within the densest lines of the electric
field. This will therefore cause the overall
voltage drop to decrease.

5
Calculating the
theoretical power
transformed

(b)

As it is easy to recognise from the design

proposals as the most likely to succeed
design, implementation 1 will be chosen to
perform calculations and show the resulting
power transformation. Furthermore since
equation (1) deals with the size of the field
just outside the plate, this equation would
be irrelevant to the other two mentioned
designs Arbitrary values were chosen in
these calculation so as to picture a rough
idea of possible voltage transformation. If a
230Vrms commercial supply is assumed, a
capacitor rating of 1000,- with a 1.
surface area and a dielectric of silicon, the
following results will be obtained.

(c)
Figure 3: The different proposed designs are
depicted in (a), (b) and (c). The green plates
represent those of the primary capacitor and
the purple plates those of the secondary
capacitor. The charges on the secondary plates
represent the alignment of the charges on the
inside of the plates as they would appear when
polarised as a result of the shown electric field
[5].

4.2

/= '

Design 2

A different layout of the potential capacitor

transformer is depicted in figure 3 (b).
Again here it is seen that the secondary
capacitor plates will interact with the
electric field generated from the primary
capacitor. Both plates will be polarised as a

(3)

From equation (3) the distance between the

plates is calculated to be approximately 4
1045 .. Using this result and equation (4),
the magnitude of the electric field between
the plates of the primary capacitor is
approximately 8.125 106 7.
3

phenomenon was also proven by showing

that a neutral conductor will become
polarised. Furthermore this conductor will
have a potential associated with it. After
proposing
three
possible
design
implementations, one of these were chosen
to be most suitable. This was a result of the
more important equation relating solely to
this design. Lastly if these two were in fact
probable then what would the resulted
power transformed amount to. Through
relevant equations and calculations with
arbitrary values chosen, a step down
capacitor was proven possible.

(4)

Now using equation (1) and the fact that an

area of about two thirds the size is in
contact, the field intensity on the outside of
the plates is calculated to be approximately
732 108 7 . This electric field magnitude
using equation (4) results in a voltage of
73V across the terminals of the secondary
capacitors plates [6]. Thus proving a
sufficient amount of power can be
transformed using design implementation
1.

Practicality

This capacitor transformer has only been

discovered to possibly transform power by
stepping down voltage. No ways in which
to step up the voltage were found.
Therefore it would only be made practical
in devices such as home appliances, where
voltage is required to be stepped down.
These types of transformers could possibly
be made more popular firstly as general
capacitors are rather inexpensive. Secondly
since the thickness of the entire device
would not need to be more than 1mm. One
set back however is the fact that the surface
area would need be quite large reaching
sizes of more than 1. .

Conclusion

Based on the research done into every

aspect needed to know it may be concluded
that a device that uses capacitors to
transform power via an electric field is
possible. Before this conclusion was able to
be drawn these aspects needed to first be
proven. Firstly if an electric field does exist
outside of the parallel plates of a capacitor
was needed to be investigated. This was
shown true and an equation to determine the
exact magnitude of the electric field was
proposed. Next whether or not the electric
field would possibly be detected by a
secondary capacitor. Moreover this
4

References

[1] J.
F.
Becker,
Physics
51,
2009.
http://www.physics.sjsu.edu/becker/physics51/e_and_v.htm.
2014].

[Online].
[Accessed

Available:
12 October

[2] G. W. Parker, Electric field outside a parallel plate capacitor, American Association of
Physics Teachers, North Carolina, 2002.
[3] College
Physics,
17
September
2014.
[Online].
http://cnx.org/contents/031da8d3-b525-429c-80cf6c8ed997733a@8.9:143/College_Physics. [Accessed 10 October 2014].

Available:

[4] D. R. Joshi, Engineering Physics, New Delih: Tata Mcgraw-Hill, 2010.

[5] R. V. Jones, Visualizing Electric Fields, 5 March 1999. [Online]. Available:
http://people.seas.harvard.edu/~jones/cscie129/nu_lectures/lecture6/field_vis/e_vis.html.
[Accessed 12 October 2014].
[6] T. R. Kuphaldt, All About Circuits, Design Science, 2009.