Folks, we need your favorite links to simple, effective, clear explanations of the basics of electricity.  Basic concepts including charge, potential, field, current, capacitance, inductance, resistance.

Thanks!

I think of electricity in terms of a garden hose. Pressure=voltage, or the potential to do mechanical work. Resistance can be varied by twisting the nozzle to a new diameter. Current is how fast the water molecules or electrons are flowing. Less resistance leads to greater flow at lower pressure. This is for the conventional current view of electricity that I chose to relate to. Eric’s description recently is based on the flow of holes, which would be air bubbles moving against the flow.

I couldn’t phrase your request right for Gistweb dot com to locate anything to summarize, but perhaps one of y’all can, or give me some search/ keyword strings to try tonight.

I typed in the search term   electricity concepts   without quotes and got 11,700,000 hits on Google.  That dropped to 22,800 hits with quotes.

This is a good site: All About Circuits

As a certified Electrician practicing in California, I have access to several sources of basic information about the fundamentals of electricity, but unfortunately many of them are proprietary, and I cannot pass them on.  The link offered by Francisi is a good one, but it might be useful to know what the information is needed for.  I don’t think that the crew building FF1 needs a primer, so is the information for FFS members who want to grasp the basic concepts?  If so, the hose/water flow analogy used by Aeronaut is a powerful one, explaining voltage, current and resistance.  Inductance and capacitance would be a bit more difficult since they require the subject to visualize processes which have no obvious analogue to use for illustration.  Again, what is the target audience and how much would they need to know?

tcg - 23 December 2010 12:02 AM

As a certified Electrician practicing in California, I have access to several sources of basic information about the fundamentals of electricity, but unfortunately many of them are proprietary, and I cannot pass them on.  The link offered by Francisi is a good one, but it might be useful to know what the information is needed for.  I don’t think that the crew building FF1 needs a primer, so is the information for FFS members who want to grasp the basic concepts?  If so, the hose/water flow analogy used by Aeronaut is a powerful one, explaining voltage, current and resistance.  Inductance and capacitance would be a bit more difficult since they require the subject to visualize processes which have no obvious analogue to use for illustration.  Again, what is the target audience and how much would they need to know?

Thanx, TCG. I think the target audience is around 5th or 6th grade level so that anybody can ‘get it’. Magnetic fields can be hinted at by using hot water (the hose would radiate warmth, simulating the presence of a magnetic field). The Left Hand Rule was hilarious to watch some foreigners try to figure out right-handed in Basic Electricity & Electronics (BEEP) School. We must define the target audience more precisely than ‘everybody.’

Francisl - 20 December 2010 07:42 PM

This is a good site: All About Circuits

This is great.  Finally found a place to put it on the website (under “Electricity”). 

Now, does anyone perchance remember that other great link to a site about everything you needed to know to understand fusion physics?  I can’t seem to locate it in my overstuffed “content to add” folder.  Hoping someone out there knows the post/keyword to find it.

Thanks!