Today, I wanted to mess around with drawing circuits, specifically those with N-channel MOSFETs. I’ve seen these things in schematics, but honestly, I never really got the symbol. So, I figured, why not learn it by actually drawing it a bunch of times?
Getting Started
First things first, I needed a reference. I could have just looked it up, I mean, it’s not exactly rocket science, but I find actually writing the symbol down helps me remember.
I grabbed a piece of paper and a pencil, that is my perfered way.I remember some basic shapes about MOSFET. Then, I started drawing.
My First Attempts
My initial attempts were, well, let’s just say they were rough. I kept messing up the direction of the arrow, and the placement of the lines for the source, drain, and gate. It all looked kind of jumbled. I drew a vertical line, then added a couple of horizontal lines sticking out for the gate, source and drain. I added a little arrow pointing inwards towards the vertical line, that means it’s an N-channel, right? I mean the arrow point to the bar.
I tried to get it right on paper. I think I messed it up 5 times before I even started to get something that looked remotely correct. I also tried to draw it in the circuit design software.I spent a good 30 minutes just drawing the same symbol over and over. Repetition is key, right?
Finally Figuring It Out
After a while, it started to click. I realized a few key things:
- The Arrow: That little arrow is super important. For an N-channel MOSFET, it points towards the vertical bar that represents the channel. If it pointed outwards, that’s a P-channel, a totally different beast.
- The Gate: The gate is the input, and it’s drawn a bit separate from the channel. It’s like a little control knob.
- Source and Drain: These are pretty intuitive. They’re the other two connections, and in the symbol, they just connect to the channel bar.
Drawing it properly
Ok, I realized the arrow should point toward the bar, from that little horizontal line to the base line. The gate is drawn as a line perpendicular to the channel but not touching it. And lastly I made sure the source and drain connections were clearly drawn on the correct part of the bar.
So, yeah, that’s my little adventure in learning the N-channel MOSFET symbol. Not exactly the most exciting thing, but hey, every little bit of knowledge helps, right? Now, when I see that symbol in a schematic, I won’t be totally lost. I’ll actually know what’s going on. Mission accomplished!