An appliance designed to work on an alternating current of 220 V and 50 cycles draws a current of 3 A.

1. What is the average current?
2. What is the amplitude of the current?

Solution:

1. Over a whole number of cycles, the average current will be zero.
2. The amplitude of the current is the absolute value of the highest or lowest value of the current. In this case, it will be I_rms√2 = I_o = 3.0 x 1.41 A = 5.64 A.