Question

Three identical resistors are connected in parallel. The equivalent resistance increases by 630 when one resistor is removed and connected in series with the remaining two, which are still in parallel. Find the resistance of each resistor.

Answer 1

Answer:

each resistor is 540 Ω

Explanation:

Let's assign the letter R to the resistance of the three resistors involved in this problem. So, to start with, the three resistors are placed in parallel, which results in an equivalent resistance $R_e$ defined by the formula:

$\frac{1}{R_e}=\frac{1}{R} } +\frac{1}{R} } +\frac{1}{R} \\\frac{1}{R_e}=\frac{3}{R} \\R_e=\frac{R}{3}$

Therefore, R/3 is the equivalent resistance of the initial circuit.

In the second circuit, two of the resistors are in parallel, so they are equivalent to:

$\frac{1}{R'_e}=\frac{1}{R} +\frac{1}{R}\\\frac{1}{R'_e}=\frac{2}{R} \\R'_e=\frac{R}{2}$

and when this is combined with the third resistor in series, the equivalent resistance ($R''_e$) of this new circuit becomes the addition of the above calculated resistance plus the resistor R (because these are connected in series):

$R''_e=R'_e+R\\R''_e=\frac{R}{2} +R\\R''_e=\frac{3R}{2}$

The problem states that the difference between the equivalent resistances in both circuits is given by:

$R''_e=R_e+630 \,\Omega$

so, we can replace our found values for the equivalent resistors (which are both in terms of R) and solve for R in this last equation:

$\frac{3R}{2} =\frac{R}{3} +630\,\Omega\\\frac{3R}{2} -\frac{R}{3} = 630\,\Omega\\\frac{7R}{6} = 630\,\Omega\\\\R=\frac{6}{7} *630\,\Omega\\R=540\,\Omega$