E
EddieM
yes very slowly.
yes very slowly.
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As an electron moves from one atom to an adjacent atom, an electron moves from that atom to another adjacent atom almost instantaneously and so on. That is how electricity travels at (almost) the speed of light, whilst each individual electron hardly moves along at all.
say it is like a long train with say 100 compartment and in each compartment there is 1 commuter, the aim of all commuters is to move forward towards the front compartment next to the engine/driver, each commuter moves one compartment forward, one at a time, but the very first one can only leave his compartment when the train is at pulled at a station, and he can only leave if there are other commuters ready to board the train, otherwise he stays in the train.
So each commuter only moves ahead only when the compartment ahead is vacant, the train is the wire, the compartments are the atoms, and the commuters are the electron, the station being the battery, charged battery means there is a pool of commuters waiting to board the train, one at a time.
so when the train stops at a station, (this is like when you switch on a circuit and the electrical path is complete) the first compartment being the most negatively charged, and the last compartment is the least negative charged or is positive compared to the first one, so commuters can only board the train from the rear and disembark from the front most compartment.
Therefore when the first commuter steps out, that compartment becomes empty, so the 2nd commuter moves into the first and 3rd commuter moves into the 2nd, and so on, until the last commuter moves from 100th compartment to 99th compartment, and then the battery (station with a pool of waiting commuters) moves into the 100th compartment that had just become vacated by its previous commuter, so the last 100th compartment gets occupied, and this happens quite fast, with all 100 commuters moving one compartment up all at the same time. each moving the same distance, one compartment at a time, the first one who leave the train and reaches his destiny can be seen as spent energy, spent in any number of ways, i.e. heat, light, motion (electric motor) etc
This is how the current flows, so if you now double the number of compartments, and two commuters can move in and out, you now have twice the amount of current flowing.
The first commuter who exited, leaves the station. when all waiting commuters at the station have boarded the train, and there are no more waiting on the station platform, (battery) to board the train, then the flow of commuters (electrons) stops, this is equal to the battery being exhausted, so no more commuters can leave from the 1st (front compartment
the battery Voltage can be represented by number of commuters in a row, waiting at a station, the more the number of the commuters in a length of row, the higher is the voltage potential, and current can be represented by how many rows there are , two rows across means double the current capacity, so if you have 20 rows across, and the train is 5 compartment wide, then only 5 commuters can board at a time, but even then if the 5 commuters disembark from the front compartments and the station's exit door was narrow and could only accommodate 3 commuters across, you then have so called resistance, this impedes the commuter flow and you get bottle necking, this is your load resistance.
The wire resistance can be the train 5 compartment wide, hence it cannot take all 20 commuters at once from the front row, however, the final number of commuters that can travel through depends on either the stations exit door width, (load resistance) or the number of compartments across, whichever is the lowest of the two figures.
aah! forgot to tell you, if a train doesn't come for a long time, then the commuters waiting at the station (the charged battery) will slowly disperse one by one, they will be sick and tired of waiting for the train, so eventually a full station becomes empty, in a battery it is called self discharge, where electrons dissipate their energy within the battery over a long period of time.
There is only one slight draw back on my anology, it cannot explain the resistance due to the length of the wire (the length of the train or number of compartments) unless you accept that if the train is so much long that by the time the first commuter has reached through all compartements and is about to leave the last one, he is nakkered!
So each commuter only moves ahead only when the compartment ahead is vacant, the train is the wire, the compartments are the atoms, and the commuters are the electron, the station being the battery, charged battery means there is a pool of commuters waiting to board the train, one at a time.
so when the train stops at a station, (this is like when you switch on a circuit and the electrical path is complete) the first compartment being the most negatively charged, and the last compartment is the least negative charged or is positive compared to the first one, so commuters can only board the train from the rear and disembark from the front most compartment.
Therefore when the first commuter steps out, that compartment becomes empty, so the 2nd commuter moves into the first and 3rd commuter moves into the 2nd, and so on, until the last commuter moves from 100th compartment to 99th compartment, and then the battery (station with a pool of waiting commuters) moves into the 100th compartment that had just become vacated by its previous commuter, so the last 100th compartment gets occupied, and this happens quite fast, with all 100 commuters moving one compartment up all at the same time. each moving the same distance, one compartment at a time, the first one who leave the train and reaches his destiny can be seen as spent energy, spent in any number of ways, i.e. heat, light, motion (electric motor) etc
This is how the current flows, so if you now double the number of compartments, and two commuters can move in and out, you now have twice the amount of current flowing.
The first commuter who exited, leaves the station. when all waiting commuters at the station have boarded the train, and there are no more waiting on the station platform, (battery) to board the train, then the flow of commuters (electrons) stops, this is equal to the battery being exhausted, so no more commuters can leave from the 1st (front compartment
the battery Voltage can be represented by number of commuters in a row, waiting at a station, the more the number of the commuters in a length of row, the higher is the voltage potential, and current can be represented by how many rows there are , two rows across means double the current capacity, so if you have 20 rows across, and the train is 5 compartment wide, then only 5 commuters can board at a time, but even then if the 5 commuters disembark from the front compartments and the station's exit door was narrow and could only accommodate 3 commuters across, you then have so called resistance, this impedes the commuter flow and you get bottle necking, this is your load resistance.
The wire resistance can be the train 5 compartment wide, hence it cannot take all 20 commuters at once from the front row, however, the final number of commuters that can travel through depends on either the stations exit door width, (load resistance) or the number of compartments across, whichever is the lowest of the two figures.
aah! forgot to tell you, if a train doesn't come for a long time, then the commuters waiting at the station (the charged battery) will slowly disperse one by one, they will be sick and tired of waiting for the train, so eventually a full station becomes empty, in a battery it is called self discharge, where electrons dissipate their energy within the battery over a long period of time.
There is only one slight draw back on my anology, it cannot explain the resistance due to the length of the wire (the length of the train or number of compartments) unless you accept that if the train is so much long that by the time the first commuter has reached through all compartements and is about to leave the last one, he is nakkered!
EddieM said:
To get a current of one amp through a wire, about 6 x 10^18 electrons must enter and leave it each second. That might sound like a lot but a cubic millimetre of copper contains 8.5 X 10^19 free electrons.
So lets take a typical wire of 1 sq mm cross section so that each mm of its length contains 8.5 x 10^19 free electrons. If those electrons all move along by 1mm per second, 8.5 x 10^19 extra ones will enter the wire while the same number will leave the other end. Since 6 x 10^18 electrons per second is an amp, the current in our wire will be a little over 14 amps, which is quite a lot of current for a wire of that size.
So why do they appear to travel at the speed of light?
Answer, because the ones at the end of the wire don't wait for the ones behind to hit them before they move. As soon as the first extra electron enters the wire, it makes its presence felt along the whole length and that information travels at the speed of light in whatever medium surrounds the wire. The 'commuters on train' model works better if each one shouts "FIRE!" as they move towards the next carriage. Note that this works just as well if the one who leaves shouts "FREE BEER!" instead. Electrons in a wire don't care whether they're being pushed from behind or pulled from the front.Mikefromlondon said:
It's because electrons don't have a free path through the copper. There are lots of atoms in their way and, because those atoms are jiggling around with thermal energy, the electrons keep bumping into them. It's a bit like trying to move through a crowded disco - and the more raucous the music, the harder it gets.
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Would you know through what mechanism or principle do the electrons flow in a circuit where the source is not a battery, i.e. where the source is electrical generator, in other words, a copper wire coil is rapidly allowed to move between the two poles of a permanent magnet, so as the coil cuts through magnetic lines of force, we say current is induced in the coil.
So question is how does this current gets induced in the circuit merely by the action of a magnetic field force lines cutting through the coil? how do these electrons needed for a current flow come from? how are they induced y a magentic field into a wire that can be insulated?????
I know the coil or the magnets have to be physically moved past each other to induce the electron flow, or the current, using mechanical energy, but how do the electrons enter the circuit so that they can perform useful work like lighting up a lamp.
Any ideas how these electrons jump into the wire circuit to the lamp, with a battery we have to physically touch conductors to allow electrons to start flowing from stored energy in the battery, so that is where they get their electrons from, but how does the circuit gets its electrons from when it is a coil moving rapidly across a magnetic field?
This phenomenon should be described in detail in the Electromagnetic Induction Theory, but I really need to know how do the electrons transfer into the conductor and start producing electrical energy??? any brains out there??
So question is how does this current gets induced in the circuit merely by the action of a magnetic field force lines cutting through the coil? how do these electrons needed for a current flow come from? how are they induced y a magentic field into a wire that can be insulated?????
I know the coil or the magnets have to be physically moved past each other to induce the electron flow, or the current, using mechanical energy, but how do the electrons enter the circuit so that they can perform useful work like lighting up a lamp.
Any ideas how these electrons jump into the wire circuit to the lamp, with a battery we have to physically touch conductors to allow electrons to start flowing from stored energy in the battery, so that is where they get their electrons from, but how does the circuit gets its electrons from when it is a coil moving rapidly across a magnetic field?
This phenomenon should be described in detail in the Electromagnetic Induction Theory, but I really need to know how do the electrons transfer into the conductor and start producing electrical energy??? any brains out there??
B
Big Tone
Mike! I don't know if you are going for the longest post award but you should know the likelihood of readers staying the distance is inversely proportional to the word count, unless It's exceptionally interesting or personal.
I hate this expression but sometimes less is more...
I hate this expression but sometimes less is more...
True, if only I could sum up the whole universe in one word, that would be God!
in short my question was :
So how do electrons flow and produce energy from a coil of wire attached to a load, i.e. how do the electrons enter the circuit from a varying magnetic field without any physical contact? (not talking about HT spark jumping an air gap!
in short my question was :
So how do electrons flow and produce energy from a coil of wire attached to a load, i.e. how do the electrons enter the circuit from a varying magnetic field without any physical contact? (not talking about HT spark jumping an air gap!
B
Big Tone
It’s a shame they didn’t sum the Bible up more concisely, instead of fairytale after fairytale.
I have some experience of electronics engineering.
It became an interest when I was about 12 years old, back in the early 70s, and much later became a career which led me to work in America. I could name-drop, but that’s not important...What I will say is when I was a teenager I tried to wrestle with semiconductors and depletion layers and blah blah blah... I just couldn’t get my head around exactly what was happening and how it did what it did. Asking clever people was no better but then, one day, someone gave me some advice I’ve never forgotten.
Instead of giving me his erudite explanation and understanding, which I'd already read and had explained to me umpteen different ways and didn't 'get', he said something which hit me like a wet fish in the face! He said "It's not important to know the intricacies and physics behind it all, but to understand how to use it".
So, for example, the old 741 op amp I used so many times back then has hundreds of semiconductors connected in such a way that probably only the designers would understand - but that isn’t important to the rest of us. What is important is how and what I do with the eight legs poking out! What they are, what they do and how to use it.
You may like me for this next bit Mike
In a similar way, you could say one doesn’t have to understand God’s ways in detail or origin to know and understand his ways. It’s far more important to know how to follow him and 'use' him for good.
And on that note I'm going to fuss my cat, make a Horlicks and go to bed. Goodnight campers
They don't enter the circuit; they're already there! The electrons in the copper atoms are induced to flow by the effects of the magnetic field which, incidentally, thinks nothing of electrical insulation!
Interestingly, in an alternating current the electrons probably don't actually travel anywhere! They just jump back and forth between a few atoms 50 times a second, yet this very small distance moved can cause similar movement hundreds of miles away along a conductor.
JBR, we both have the same interest then, I am well into electronics as well, and own 11 moggies!
People like you and i are probably more curious than most as we want to know how things work, and why they work.
I have destroyed more radios and electronic gadgets just to find out how things tick!
Good job I did not take up medicine! God knows how many people would have needed to sacrifice their lives for me to gain knowledge in medicine!
People like you and i are probably more curious than most as we want to know how things work, and why they work.
I have destroyed more radios and electronic gadgets just to find out how things tick!
Good job I did not take up medicine! God knows how many people would have needed to sacrifice their lives for me to gain knowledge in medicine!
Electrons are hetrosexual, they are attracted to their opposite sex the protons. Which one would you say is the male and which one is the female?
And final question why do electrons which appears to move towards protons, and I have never heard of protons moving towards electrons? that is a bit gay isn't it?
And don't forget electrons are deflected by both electrostatic field as well as magnetic deflection, so there is your clue how electrons move in a coil of wire when subjected to a varying magnetic field. The lines of force of magnet pushes or deflects on electrons to move in one or the other direction depending on the polarity of the magnetic field, thus allowing the current to flow.
The current must flow from one end of the coil (say the starting end) into one end of the load, and out of the other end of the load and move back into the coil at its other end of the coil. so as long as the magnetic lines of force continues to strike or cut across the coil, or the field continually varying, through this coil, the electrons flow, and it is the flow of electrons that provides the electrical energy.
Obviously no new energy is being created here, so no new electrons are being formed, only that the mechanical energy in moving either the coil or the magnetic field is simply moving the electrons along a wire and into the load.
In an AC,where a magnetic field reverses polarity rapidly, i.e. north and south poles of the field cut across the coil successively, the electrons flow out from one end of the coil and re-enter from the same end when the field reverses.
Obviously it has been well established the relationship of electrons flowing in a coil can not only create a magnetic field (electro-magnet) but also the reverse occurs where magentic field can interfere with electrons and deflect/move/push them along a wire to convert mechanical power into electrical power)
Now this clearly means that if new electrons cannot be created, then the stored energy in a chemical battery must undergo chemical change so as to provide electrical energy, I used to think that when batteries are being charged, they are being filled up with electrons! so that can't be that then.
off to buy cat food for my 11 cats!
Protons are over 1800 times heavier than neutrons, put a few of them in the nucleus of an atom with a few neutrons of the same sort of weight.
Thanks sooey, so protons are coach potatoes!
Been looking into lead acid battery how it stores charge, so I had guessed it right that no new electrons are created in any energy transformation, the lead plates used in a battery with an electrolyte solution, (sulfuric acid solution) simply transfers electrons from one plate to the other during a charge and transfers it back during a discharge, hence the plates determine the amount of energy a battery can yield or store, and when the plates acquire a coating of sulphite crystals, it reduces the capacity of the battery as well as its internal resistance and its ability to recharge effectively. I never paid attention to these things before, as I took them for guaranteed and really thought during charging process we were filling it up with external electrons from a charging source, but now I understand if that was the case it would go against law of conservation of energy.
The charging current is used to push the electrons back to the negative p-late from the positive plate where they end up when a battery is in use.
Been looking into lead acid battery how it stores charge, so I had guessed it right that no new electrons are created in any energy transformation, the lead plates used in a battery with an electrolyte solution, (sulfuric acid solution) simply transfers electrons from one plate to the other during a charge and transfers it back during a discharge, hence the plates determine the amount of energy a battery can yield or store, and when the plates acquire a coating of sulphite crystals, it reduces the capacity of the battery as well as its internal resistance and its ability to recharge effectively. I never paid attention to these things before, as I took them for guaranteed and really thought during charging process we were filling it up with external electrons from a charging source, but now I understand if that was the case it would go against law of conservation of energy.
The charging current is used to push the electrons back to the negative p-late from the positive plate where they end up when a battery is in use.
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