The name indicates that it is an electrical component that produces induction. Specifically, it induces a magnetic field when it is crossed by a current. Also called a coil or solenoid.
In principle, any conductor could be used to build a coil. It is made by winding conductive wire in circles, giving several turns, so as to form a helicoid. To prevent the coiled wire from shorting into contact with itself when coiled, enameled wire is used in the making of the inductor. Each turn the wire makes is called a loop.
Functioning
When a current flows through the turns, a magnetic field is induced that crosses the helical cylinder in its length, and also on the outside of the solenoid. This is known as Faraday’s law . The inductive capacity of a coil can be measured through its own parameter called autoinductance, or simply inductance. When a coil interacts magnetically with others, a phenomenon called mutual inductance occurs, to be reckoned with in some circuits.
The inductance of a coil can be improved if the coils are wound around a core of ferromagnetic material.
In direct current, what is most used in inductors is the magnetic capacity, while in alternating current, and in variable electrical signal regimes, the behavior of the inductor is used as a variator of the electrical signal over time.
Uses of inductors
In engines. In electric motors, coils are used to build machines whose rotational movement is generated by the interaction of the magnetic fields produced in said coils.
Electric transformers. These teams use the Faraday principle to spread an electric current of a certain voltage to another current flow under another voltage wirelessly. Transformers, in addition to modifying the voltage / current to the desired, serve as a protection line for electrical equipment.
Electric locks. The field produced inside the coils can be used so that the ferromagnetic bar that forms the nucleus moves along itself. This serves to make the core work as an actuator element to release or secure a lock.
Doorbells. In some timbres the oscillating magnetic field is used to produce sound through vibration
Differential switches. They use movable core inductors as an element to trip the safety switch.
Modulation circuits. Traditionally inductors have been used as elements that play an important role in the transmission and reception of modulated signals, as in the case of radio systems. Here, the phenomena associated with the behavior of inductors in alternating current are used to build circuits that allow the transmission and reception of radio signals.
Modern electronics allows the manufacture of circuits that behave like inductors for the effects of electrical signals at various frequencies. This allows miniaturization of inductors without the use of coils.
