How can the discharge rate of a capacitor be controlled?

[Hamza Abbasi]

Hi , Can we replace battery with capacitor?? I know that energy stored in a battery is far greater than in the capacitors ,but still can we some how convert a charged capacitor into a temporary battery?? So the Question is how to control the discharge rate of capacitor? Is this have something to do with RC Time constant?

 

[LittleMrsMonkey]

Changing the resictance would be an obvious way to go.

 

[Hamza Abbasi]

Changing the resictance would be an obvious way to go.

Is there some IC or something like that for slowing the discharging rate exponentially?

 

[nasu]

See "ultracapacitors" for some applications where the batteries are replaced by capacitors.

From what I seen, the voltage decreases a lot more sharply during discharge than in a battery.

 

[CWatters]

Batteries approximate to a constant voltage source, a capacitor doesn't. For a capacitor..

Q=CV
I = CdV/dt
so
dV/dt = I/C

So the voltage "curve" depends on the load current. If you discharge at a constant current the voltage falls in a straight line. If it's a constant resistance load you get the classic exponential curve.

If the load must get a constant voltage (not all need that) then some sort of voltage regulator, perhaps a switching type, can be used to provide it.

You don't always need a voltage regulator. The motor in an electric car for example doesn't necessarily need a constant voltage but it does need some form of speed control. It may well be possible to build one control unit that accepts the variable voltage from a capacitor and outputs whatever the motor requires.