ELECTRONIC CIRCUITS

LESSON 10
INTRODUCTION TO BIASING OF TRANSISTOR CIRCUIT

Objective
In this lesson, I will be explaining you the concept of biasing
done in the transistor circuit. The biasing of transistor is done
to fix the operating point or Q-point of the transistor in Active
region, Saturation region and Cut-off region of operation. I
will explain you a simple biasing circuit in this lesson. The input
and output characteristics will also be discussed with you. At the
end of the lesson we will talk about the design and mathemati-
cal aspect of the biasing.
Lesson
My guide to biasing differs from conventional approach, in that
I have started by describing the effects that biasing has on the
output waveform, before moving on to the bias circuits.
A bipolar junction transistor, (BJT) is very versatile. It can be
used in many ways, as an amplifier, a switch or an oscillator and
many other uses too. Before an input signal is applied its After the initial bend, the curves approximate a straight line.
operating conditions need to be set. This is achieved with a The slope or gradient of each line represents the output
suitable bias circuit, some of which I will describe. A bias circuit impedance, for a particular input base current. So what has all
allows the operating conditions of a transistor to be defined, so this got to do with biasing? Take, for example the middle curve.
that it will operate over a pre-determined range. This is normally The collector emitter voltage is displayed up to 20 volts. Let’s
achieved by applying a small fixed dc voltage to the input assume that we have a single stage amplifier, working in
terminals of a transistor. common emitter mode, and the supply voltage is 10 volts. The
Bias design can take a mathematical approach or can be simpli- output terminal is the collector, the input is the base, where do
fied using transistor characteristic curves. The characteristic you set the bias conditions? The answer is anywhere on the flat
curves predict the performance of a BJT. There are three curves, part of the graph. However, imagine the bias is set so that the
an input characteristic curve, a transfer characteristic curve and an collector voltage is 2 volts. What happens if the output signal is
output characteristic curve. Of these curves, the most useful for 4 volts peak to peak ? Depending on whether the transistor
amplifier design is the output characteristics curve. The output used is a PNP or NPN, then one half cycle will be amplified
characteristic curves for a BJT are a graph displaying the output cleanly, the other cycle will approach the limits of the power
voltages and currents for different input currents. The linear supply and will “clip”. This is shown below :
(straight) part of the curve needs is utilized for an amplifier or
oscillator. For use as a switch, a transistor is biased at the
extremities of the graph, these conditions are known as “cut-
off” and”saturation”.
Output Characteristics Curves
For each transistor configuration, common emitter, common
base and emitter follower the output curves are slightly
different. A typical output characteristic for a BJT in common
emitter mode are shown below :-

The above diagram shows a 4 volt peak to peak waveform with

clipping on the positive half cycle. This is caused by setting the
bias at a value other than half the supply voltage.

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 is a BC107A. The values of Rb and Rc can be determined by
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either mathematical approach or by using the output character-

istic curves for the BC107A.

Quiescent Point (Q-Point)

The lower diagram shows the same amplifier, but here the bias
is set so that collector voltage is half the value of the supply
voltage. Hence, it is a good idea to set the bias for a single stage
amplifier to half the supply voltage, as this allows maximum
output voltage swing in both directions of an output wave-
form.
Input Characteristic Curves-
Before describing the bias circuits, it is worthwhile looking at a
typical input characteristic curve for a small signal BJT. The
following is the input characteristic for a transistor in common
emitter mode, it is a plot of input base emitter voltage verses
base current. It is shown with both x and y axis slightly
zoomed.
The point Vo in the diagram above is where the output signal
would be taken. For simplicity, the input signal and coupling
capacitors have been omitted. For minimum distortion and
clipping it is desirable to bias this point to half the supply
voltage, 10 volts dc in this case. This is also known as the
quiescent point. The ac output signal would then be superim-
posed on the dc bias voltage. The Q-point is sometimes
indicated on the output characteristics curves for a transistor
amplifier. The quiescent point also refers to the dc conditions
(bias conditions) of a circuit without an input signal.
Q-Point Value
I have mentioned that setting the Q-point to half the supply
voltage is a good idea. It gives a circuit the highest margin for
overload. However, any amplifier will clip if the input ampli-
tude exceeds the limit for which the circuit was designed.
However, there are certain cases when it is not necessary to bias a
stage to half the supply voltage. Examples would be an RF
amplifier design where the input signal is in microvolts or
millivolts. If the stage had a gain of 200 then the output
(assuming a 2mV peak input) would only need to swing up
and down 400mV about the Q-point. Hence a stage with a
supply voltage of 12 volts could have its Q-point set at 10 volts
or even 2 volts without problems. Another example would be a
microphone stage where similar low level input signals are
involved.
Output Characteristic Curve for a BC107A

The base emitter voltage, Vbe is quoted in most text books as

either 0.6 V or 0.7 V Both values are an approximation, and as
can be seen from the above graph the value of Vbe varies
between this range. For small signal work with base currents of
50uA or below a value for Vbe of 0.6 volts is a reasonable
quote. For higher base currents, a Vbe of 0.7 V is a better
approximation. In fact, in a large power transistor, the Vbe
value can be even higher. The value of Vbe also varies widely
with temperature change.
Simple Bias Circuit
The simplest bias circuit is shown below. It consists only of a
fixed bias resistor and load resistor. The BJT is operating in
common emitter mode. The dc current gain or beta, h FE is the
ratio of dc collector current divided by dc base current. The BJT

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Bias Design

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The collector voltage Vc for the simple bias design is 10 volt.
The dc current gain, h FE for the BC107A is obtained from the
manufacturer’s data sheets and varies between devices. A typical
beta is around 290. Taking a base current of 20uA and reading
values direct from the output curves, the collector current, for a
collector emitter voltage of 10 volts is around 3.9mA. As h FE=
Ic / Ib then a BC107A must have a beta of at least 3.9mA /
20uA = 195 to work with this circuit. Also, the base emitter
voltage, Vbe is typically 0.6v. Knowing the above data and using
ohm’s law, values for Rb and Rc can be determined:
Rb = Vcc - Vbe / Ib = (20-0.6) / 20u = 970k use (1M)
Rc = Vc / Ic = 10 / 3.9m = 2.56K use (2.7K)
Mathematical Approach-
Without using the output characteristic curve, values for Rb and
Rc can still be calculated. A value for h FE must be estimated first
and a desired collector current. As h FE varies in each transistor
the value chosen should be the lowest value from the
manufacturer’s data sheets. The equations to use are:
Rc = Vc / Ic
Ib = Ic / h FE
Rb = Vcc - 0.6 / Ib.
Using the example above with Vcc=20 and h FE =195 yields the
same values.
Conclusion
In this lesson we have studied the basic concepts of biasing
done in a transistor circuit. The need of biasing was discussed
with you. I think now you would have idea about why the
biasing is been done in the transistor. Then we discussed the
input and output characteristics of the transistor and how to fix
the operating or Q-point of the transistor operation. We
studied a simple biasing circuit in this lesson with design and
mathematical approach.

Notes

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