How to use Potentiometer in lab

A potentiometer is a resistor which has three terminal and a sliding contact between the center terminal and the two other end terminals which acts like a variable resistor or an adjustable voltage divider.

You have to follow the simple steps below in order to use the potentiometer in your circuit as per your application.

Steps to make Potentiometer Connection in Lab

Step 1: Navigate through devices/components in the above options and locate the icon of potentiometer as shown in the snapshot below.

Step 2: Click on the icon of the Potentiometer as shown in the screenshot above or grab the icon, You will see a  potentiometer on the board below.

Step 3: Connect the Potentiometer in the circuit as per your application.

Controlling the properties of the Potentiometer

While working with a circuit with a potentiometer all you have to do is to click on the potentiometer and a Gear shape will be displayed near to the potentiometer as shown in the image below.

Click on the gear icon shown in the above screenshot and a box with potentiometer properties will show up as shown in the screen shot below.

The Potentiometer can be controlled either rotating the wipe at the center of the Potentiometer (which is similar to the real life method) or you can use the wipe bar in the Potentiometer properties in order to control the resistance value of the Potentiometer.

Components in Potentiometer Properties

1. In the Track Resistance you can control the resistance value of the preset which is from one end terminal to another end of the terminal, Also we can select the fractional value from the options of nano, µ, mili, x1, K, M, G.
2. With the help of Slidebar we can control the resistance value of the potentiometer which is similar to controlling the track resistance in the above.
3. In this you can tune or control the resistance value of a potentiometer in a fractional scale such as nano, µ, and milli Ω.
4. The part is used to slide the wipe of the potentiometer.

Potentiometer Working

In the below example a Potentiometer of 1 KΩ has been selected in order to demonstrate the working of the potentiometer. There are two multimeters have been used in order to measure the resistance of both that is the left as well as right side of the potentiometer.

In the snapshot the wiper of the potentiometer is set to the 25% from the left due to which the left side shows the resistance of 250Ω and the right side shows the resistance of 750Ω.

In the above snapshot the wiper of the potentiometer is set to the 50% from the left due to which the both the left as well as the right side shows the resistance of 500Ω.

In the snapshot the wiper of the potentiometer is set to the 75% from the left due to which the left side shows the resistance of 750Ω and the right side shows the resistance of 250Ω.

Controlling the wipe of the potentiometer

In the above screenshot there are four identical circuit setup named as A, B and C, the track resistance of the potentiometer is 1 Ω in each .

• In the circuit A the position of the wipe is at zero hence there is 0 Ω resistance value in the potentiometer which results the whole current of 1.5 A to flow.
• In the circuit B the position of the wipe is at the half of it so there is 0.5 Ω resistance value in the potentiometer due to which there is a current flow of 0.993 A.
• In the circuit C the wipe is positioned to the full length which results the 1 Ω resistance value in the potentiometer which causes the 0.75 A of current to flow.