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Re: Electricity as Water (was RE: Dupla cables)

> From: "Adam R. Novitt" <novitt at javanet_com>
> Subject: RE: Dupla cables
>
> I'm not sure if the analogy is totally accurate but... If electricity were
> water, amps would be pressure (PSI), and volts would be volume (GPH).

Did you perhaps mean that volts are like pressure and amps are like volume?
Higher amperage requires thicker wire to carry it safely (like a bigger pipe
to carry more water) and higher voltage requires a better insulator (like a
stronger pipe).


>  A light bulb or a stove or anything is kind of
> like forcing that water through a series of water wheels, only so much can
> get through at a given time.

The higher the resistance the less current will flow.  Again, very much like
water volume. However more pressure (voltage) will increase the current flow
for a given resistance.

>  In our case, with the heating cables, the AWG
> 30 wire is like a little tiny pipe.  Instead of having the electricity
> exhort pressure on the walls of the pipe, as say a pump would, it creates
> heat.   One weird thing is that as the length of the pipe or wire increase
> the wattage lost to pressure/heat actually decreases.

Not so very strange - a longer pipe also causes reduced water flow.

I have never figured out a simple way to represent watts in the "Electricity
as water" metaphor.  The product of pressure and volume is probably
proportional to  ability to drive a turbine, which would relate it to total
energy (watts), but few listeners have real world experience of that to
relate to.

Frank.
-----
The very act of seeking sets something in motion to meet us;
something in the universe, or in the unconscious responds as if
to an invitation.  - Jean Shinoda Bolen

http://home.istar.ca/~fir