Understanding How Relations Work On Electronic Devices

How the relay works (freepic)

YOGYAKARTA - Relay is an important component in the electronic world that functions as an automatic switch. Work based on the principle of electromagnetism, how does relay work?

With the ability to control large electric currents with small signals, relays are widely used in various applications, ranging from household appliances to industry.

Reporting from the Whatstuff explanation page, the relay was discovered in 1835 by American electromagnetism pioneer Joseph Henry.

At a demonstration in the College of New Jersey, Henry used small electromagnets to power and shut down larger electromagnets, and speculated that relays could be used to control electric engines from very far away.

Henry applied this idea to another discovery he was working on at the time, namely an electric telegraph, which William Cooke and Charles Wheatstone managed to develop in England and (more famous) by Samuel FB Morse in the United States.

Relay was then used in early phone and electronic computer playback and remained so popular that transistors appeared in the late 1940s. Interestingly, it is estimated that there are around 70 million relays operating in the United States at that time alone.

The transistor itself is a small electronic component that can perform similar jobs with relays, serving as a booster or switch.

Although transistors can move faster, using much less electricity, eating a small amount of space, and the price is much cheaper than relays, generally only works with small currents so the relays are still in use.

It was transistor development that spurred the computer revolution from the middle of the 20th century onwards. But without a relay, there would be no transistor.

Also read the article discussing Security Devices Used to Prevent Short Circuits

Sensors are very sensitive electronic equipment and produce only small electric currents. But often we need it to power larger equipment that uses larger currents.

Relay bridges the gap, and allows small currents to activate larger currents. That means the relay can function either as a switch (turning on and off something) or as a booster (turning a small current into a larger current).

Relay is an electromagnetic switch operating by relatively small electric currents, which can turn on or off much larger electric currents.

The heart of a relay is an electromagnet, or wire coil that becomes a temporary magnet when electricity flows through it.

You can view the relay as a kind of electric lever, which works with a small current and it turns on ("boosting up") other devices using a much larger current.

For example, relays can be useful when you want to make an electronically operated cooler that turns on or off the fan when your room temperature changes.

You can use some kind of electronic thermometer series to detect temperature, but the problem is it will only produce a small electric current too small to turn on an electric motor in a very large fan.

Instead, you can connect the armometer series to a series of relay inputs. When a small current flows in this series, the relay will activate its output series, and allow a much larger current to flow and turn on the fan.

However, relays don't always turn something on and sometimes they really help turn something off.

In power generation equipment and power transmission lines, for example, you will find protective relays that work when there is a disturbance to prevent damage due to things like a surge in currents.

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