University of Bahrain

College of Engineering
Electrical and Electronic Engineering Department

Equipotential and Flux Line

Mapping

Students name: Sayed Hasan Majed 20182931

Sayed Jaffer Mustafa 20153184
Mohammed Ali 20191133

Instructor: Mrs. Zahra Mahdi

Program: Electrical & Electronics Engineering
Objective:
To find the equipotential lines and field lines of a dipole.
Apparatus:
1. The PASCO Scientific Field Mapper:
(a) 1 sheet of conductive paper
(b) A silver conductive pen
(c) Corkboard working surface
(d) Push pins for attaching conductive paper to corkboard
(e) Template
2. Voltmeter
3. Power Supply
4. Wires

Procedure and Observation:

(A) Preparation of the Experiment:
1. Place the conductive paper, printed side up, on a smooth surface. (NOT on the
cork board).
2. Shake the conductive ink pen for 20 seconds.
3. Remove the cap and press the tip of the pen on a scrap paper while squeezing
the pen barrel to start ink flowing.
4. Using the template draw two dipoles on the conductive paper with a separation
of 10cm.
5. Allow the ink 20 minutes to dry before starting the experiment.
6. When dry, place the conductive paper on the corkboard.

(B) Obtaining the Equipotential Lines:

1. Using the wires and push pins, connect the positive to one electrode and the
negative supply to the electrode to obtain a dipole of opposite charge as shown in
Figure 1.
2. Connect the ground lead of the voltmeter to one of the electrodes. This electrode
becomes the reference.
3. Using the second voltmeter lead as a probe, measure the potential at different
points on the conducting paper by touching the paper with the probe. Refer to
Figure 2.
4. To map the equipotential points, perform the following:
(a) Probe the conductive paper for all the points that measure 1V.
(b) Mark these points and draw a line through them all.
(c) Repeat steps 3 and 4 for points with potential 2-15V in steps of 2-3V
(d) Now you should have the equipotential lines drawn on the conductive paper.
 Figure 1. The experimental set up for determining the Equipotential Lines.

(C) Obtaining the Field Lines:

1. Set the power supply to 20V.
2. Using the wires and push pints, connect the positive supply to one electrode and
the negative supply to the other electrode to obtain a dipole of opposite charge as
shown in Figure 2.
3. Tape the two leads of the voltmeter together such that there is a constant distance
between their connectors.
4. Start by placing the ground lead at a point close to one of the electrodes on the
conductive paper.
5. Keeping the ground lead stationary, pivot the probe lead around until you measure
the highest potential reading on the voltmeter.
6. Draw the dotted arrow from the ground lead to the probe lead.
7. Now place the ground lead of the voltmeter at the tip of the arrow and repeat steps
3 and 4.
8. Repeat steps 3-5 until the arrows reach the other electrode on the conductive paper,
the same electrode of the edge of the conductive paper.
9. Repeat steps 2-6 starting from a different point close to the first electrode on the
conductive paper.
10. Now you will have a number of field lines in the form of arrows drawn on the
conductive paper.

Figure 2. The experimental set up for determining the field lines.

Discussion:
1. Are there points of equal potential on the conductive paper? Why?
A. There are points of equal potential as indicated by the equipotential line, where we
observed that there is no change in potential as we move along the equipotential
line.

2. Are these all the equipotential lines that exist on the conductive paper?
A. There are many equipotential line around an electric charge, however we indicated
only three for the sake of observing.

3. Are these all the field lines on the conductive paper?

A. There are many field lines present, however we indicating only few for the sake of
observing, where we realized that as we get further from a point charge, the electric
field intensity gets weaker.

4. Do the arrows represent the actual field strength at each point? Why?
A. These arrows don’t really represent the actual field strength at each point, but rather
the direction only. The actual field strength at each point can be deduced using
Coulomb’s Law and F = E/q.

5. How are the field lines related to the equipotential lines you drew in part B of this
experiment?
A. We know that the electric field can be expressed as 𝐸 = ∇𝑉, so the electric field
points in the direction of the greatest change in electric potential is normal to the
equipotential line.
6. What are the equipotential lines?
A. Equipotential lines are like contour lines on a map which trace lines of equal
altitude. In this case the "altitude" is electric potential or voltage. Equipotential
lines are always perpendicular to the electric field. In three dimensions, the lines
form equipotential surfaces. Movement along an equipotential surface requires no
work because such movement is always perpendicular to the electric field.

7. What are field lines?

A. Field line is an imaginary line or curve in a field of force, such as an electric field,
where the direction of the line at any point is that of the force in the field at that
point.

8. What do the field lines and equipotential lines of a dipole look like? Why?
A. The field line are arrows moving from the positive charge towards the negative
charge, while some field lines are bending as seen in the figure. The equipotential
lines are like circles surrounding the charges.

9. What is the relationship between the direction of the maximum field increase and
the equipotential lines at any point?
A. An equipotential surface has electric potential same throughout its surface and an
electric dipole is nothing but two point charges of equal magnitude but opposite in
polarity and separated by some finite(mostly very small) distance.

The relationship is given by E = -∇V = -[ i∂/∂x + j∂/∂y + k∂/∂z ] V

where i, j, k are unit vectors
 10. Were you able to reach the objective of this experiment? How?
A. We were able to reach the objective of this experiment, where we learnt about the
field lines and the direction, which is from positive point charge to negative point
charge. Furthermore, we learned about equipotential lines, where all points along
an equipotential line have the same potential.

Conclusion:
In this experiment, we deduced that the electric field lines originate from positive charges
towards the negative charges. Moreover, we realized that equipotential lines are
perpendicular to the electric field lines, and that the electric potential decreases as we move
away from an electrode. Also, we learnt that charge move from high potential to low
potential, but never between points of equal potential. There were few sources of errors in
this experiment, including fluctuations in the electric potential along the same equipotential
line.

Lab Work: