A Note on Loading Effect

Example of loading effect Consider the circuits shown in Figure 1.

io 0

io 0

(a) Figure 1 Voltage dividers.

(b)

With their outputs not loaded, meaning not connected to any load so that the currents at the output io 0 , the transfer functions for the circuits are given by For circuit (a),
G1 E2 R2 E1 R1 R2

For circuit (b),

G2

E4 R4 E3 R3 R4

Example: with R1 R2 20k, and R3 R4 10k , e2 0.5e1 , and e4 0.5e3 . If the output of the circuit in Fig. 1(a) is connected to the input of the circuit in Fig. 1(b) as shown in Figure 2, a load current i3 will be drawn by circuit (b) as shown. This current will cause the voltage e2 at the output of circuit (a) going into circuit (b) to drop, the higher the load current, the greater the voltage drop. This is the loading effect.

i1
i2

i3

io 0

Figure 2. For the circuit in Figure 2, with the values of resistances as given earlier, we can easily e e determine that e2 1 , and e4 1 . Thus, due to the loading effect, the output of 3 6 circuit (a) has dropped from 0.5e1 to 0.33e1 . If there is no loading effect when circuit (a) is connected in series with circuit (b), the final output voltage from circuit (b) would have been e4 (0.5)(0.5)e1 0.25e1 .

Output Impedance and Input Impedance When two linear circuits, say circuit (a) and circuit (b) are cascaded together, or connected in series, as in the example before, then if the output impedance of circuit (a) is low compared with the input impedance of circuit (b), then there will be negligible loading effect. Typical operational amplifiers have very low output impedance and very high input impedance. In general, therefore, when the output of an operational amplifier is used to drive another circuit, there will be negligible loading effects.
In 1883, Lon Charles Thvenin, states that any linear circuit, no matter how complex, is electrically equivalent to a voltage source connected in series to an impedance. The equivalent circuit is Thevenins Equivalent Circuit and the series impedance is the output impedance. Further please check http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/vol_1/chpt_10/8.html.