The exponential settling bound for RC sinusoidal turn-on measures the decaying error relative to the persistent sinusoid's amplitude, rather than dividing by a sinusoid that repeatedly crosses zero. For the RC circuit in sinusoidal steady state, put and let be the sinusoidal particular solution. Subtracting its equation from the full circuit equation gives
For source and an initially uncharged capacitor, the parent article derives and steady amplitude . Thus the normalized transient is exactly
Because it decreases monotonically, an error threshold is met at all subsequent times once
This is a transient-to-amplitude specification, not a pointwise relative error at each zero crossing.
For an original comparison, choose , , and . The stated cosine turn-on needs . If the switching wave phase is unknown, the initial steady-state value can instead have magnitude as large as . With zero initial capacitor electric potential difference, the worst-switching-phase settling bound for a first-order circuit is , requiring . The shorter first result depends on the specified switching phase.
An unknown stored initial energy changes the leading mismatch again; the same exponential identity still applies. A bench test must therefore record the switching phase, initial capacitor electric potential difference, and the chosen normalization. MIT's RC laboratory measures the natural decay with square-wave excitation and then compares sinusoidal amplitudes and phases on an oscilloscope.[ref]
Sinusoidal steady state 2026-11-05
The sinusoidal steady state of a stable linear time-invariant system driven by a sinusoid is its persistent response at the driving frequency, after the relevant transient response has decayed. A phasor calculation finds that response; it does not generally satisfy the circuit's switch-on initial conditions. The late-time assumption is explicit in Berggren's treatment of sinusoidal circuit analysis.[ref]
Using peak phasors, write the source as . If is the relevant transfer function, its particular solution is
The complete response adds a homogeneous solution determined by the initial conditions. Approaching the displayed expression requires the modes affecting the measured output to decay; an unchanged amplitude and a fixed phase shift then characterize its frequency response.
For an original turn-on example, drive a series RC circuit with for , measure the capacitor's electric potential difference, and take . With time constant , Kirchhoff's voltage law gives the first-order linear differential equation
Put . Substitution verifies the sinusoidal particular solution . Adding and imposing the initial condition fixes , giving
Its sinusoidal part has amplitude and lags by . The exponential settling bound for RC sinusoidal turn-on, relative to that amplitude, is
With chosen , , and , we have and . At turn-on the phasor approximation predicts 0.5 volt while the capacitor is initially at zero. After 5 milliseconds, their difference is about 3.37 millivolts, or 0.476 percent of the sinusoidal amplitude. A 1 percent settling time threshold for this specific switch-on is about .
Figure 1.
A phasor response omits the exponential switch-on transient
. Original RC example with time constant 1 millisecond and driving angular frequency 1000 radians per second. The exact capacitor response starts at zero, approaches its sinusoidal particular solution and crosses a one-percent relative transient threshold after about 4.259 time constants. Details.
A useful measurement compares a long, low-frequency square-wave response with sinusoidal responses at several frequencies. An oscilloscope can identify the exponential decay and then measure amplitude ratios and phase shifts. MIT's laboratory uses that sequence to connect the time constant to the sinusoidal response; probe loading belongs in the measured circuit model.[ref]
Undamped resonant forcing has no bounded sinusoidal steady state. For an ideal series LC circuit, let be electric charge and . At resonance, the equation
has the particular solution . Its growing envelope prevents a bounded attracting sinusoidal response. This ideal counterexample explains why decay of the relevant homogeneous solutions is part of the physical steady-state assumption.
The worst-switching-phase settling bound for a first-order circuit maximizes the initial transient over the source's unknown switching wave phase. For the stable RC circuit, let its sinusoidal particular solution be , where , and let be the initial capacitor electric potential difference. The error identity in exponential settling bound for RC sinusoidal turn-on gives
Since ranges from minus one to one,
For a validated initial bound , the sharp uniform bound is therefore . It is attained by choosing the extreme initial value and the opposite steady-state wave phase. A normalized error tolerance is guaranteed thereafter if
There is no division by the instantaneous sinusoid, so its zero crossings cause no singular relative-error specification.
For an original example, choose , , , and . The worst-case settling time is . Assuming an uncharged capacitor instead would give . That shorter guarantee requires the additional initial-state information.
A phase-locked test can measure a smaller mismatch, even zero for a specially matched initial condition, without contradicting the worst-case result. A valid comparison records both the switching wave phase and the capacitor's initial state. The MIT laboratory's square-wave natural-decay observation and sinusoidal amplitude/wave phase measurement provide the two underlying bench measurements.[ref] The result assumes the same linear first-order model throughout switching; additional modes or a time-varying component require another transient bound.