What dictates the rectifier type?

[fiesta55]

After the thread below about the Plexi circuit I've been doing a lot of thnking about rectification.What dictates the type of SS rectifier?How does it relate to a PT without a CT or to a power trnsformer with a center tap?
When should you use a half wave,full wave or full wave bridge.
TIA

[Ptron]

In most cases you use a full wave bridge rectifier on a non-center-tapped transformer and a half wave rectifier on a center tapped transformer. The full wave bridge gives you B+ and ground, whereas the ground refernce comes from the center tap in the half-wave configuration.

I think the center tapped/half wave configuration was the norm when (relatively expensive) tubes were used for rectification. With solid state rectification, it became cheaper to use a couple extra diodes than the extra transformer windings a half wave config requires to put out the same voltage.

Speaking of which, you can ignore the center tap and use a full wave bridge but your output voltage will double! This is because the half wave config only uses half the secondary for each half of the voltage swing while the FWB uses the whole secondary in each direction.

[steve]

After the thread below about the Plexi circuit I've been doing a lot of thnking about rectification.What dictates the type of SS rectifier?How does it relate to a PT without a CT or to a power trnsformer with a center tap?
When should you use a half wave,full wave or full wave bridge.
TIA

Take a look at this .pdf file. I think it explains half wave, full wave and full wave bridge transformer circuits very well:

http://www.hammondmfg.com/pdf/5c007.pdf

steve

[DirtyGeorge]

Ptron, I think you are refering a full wave not a half wave rectifier in your center tapped description. A center tapped secondary with a diode on each leg and center tap grounded in a full wave circuit.

A half wave circuit usually has no center tap and one diode. The common bias circuit is an example of a half wave rectifier. Half wave circuits are best suited to low load applications since they recharge the filter caps at half the frequency of full wave circuits.

DG

[Ptron]

oops. When I was saying half wave when I ment full wave.