Catalog of Sites and Images

Electricity Links

Don't Panic

Hopetoun Falls, Beech Forest, near Otway National Park, Victoria, Australia.

Credit: Wikipedia contributor David Iliff. According to Wikipedia permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version.

Download site: Wikipedia: Image:Hopetoun falls.jpg.

1. Images.

2. alternating current (AC) Images.

3. ammeter Images.

4. battery Images.
   battery videos:
   1. MIT genuises with lightbulb The infamous video of light-bulb-wire-battery test. Those poor MIT grads---they will never live it down. The real trick is to do it with one hand.

5. Benjamin Franklin (1706--1790) Images. Old Ben named positive and negative charges positive and negative. He sort of got them wrong too since it would have been better with the names exchanged for then conventional current would flow the same way as actual current one would think. But he couldn't have known this---out of two choices he ... ---it wasn't the only time he had to guess out of two choices---``We must, indeed, all hang together or, most assuredly, we shall all hang separately.'' ( BrainyQuote).

6. capacitors. Images. In our lab, we use modern high-capacitance capacitors: C = 1.0 F which is really high compared to typical student lab capacitors of microfarads, nanofarad, or picofarad scales. Ours are---or so Dana tells me---electrolytic capacitors (of the tantalum capacitor) variety. Electrolytic capacitors have a definite polarity for safe operation: the longer terminal lead is for positive and the shorter for negative for radial electrolytic capacitors like ours (see Wikipedia: Electrolytic capacitor: Polarity). This is unlike ordinary old capacitors where either terminal can be used for positive/negative. Used the wrong way, an electrolytic capacitor could fail, perhaps dangerously so. But Dana tells me he's used them either way without problem---but it may be that he's just used them in some safe potential region.

7. Charles-Augustin de Coulomb (1736--1806) Images.

8. circuit diagram Images.

9. circuit theory No images.

10. coaxial cable Images.

11. coltan No images. Coltan is an ore from which which tantalum (a chemical element) is extracted. Tantalum is one of the best materials for making small powerful capacitors used in cell phones. Illicit coltan mining in east Africa is threatening wildlife, especially the eastern lowland gorilla, as miners and rebels (of various kinds) exploit it ( Coltan, Gorillas and cellphones. So cell phones may be helping to drive the gorilla to extinction. The law of unintended consequences in action.

12. corona discharge Images.

13. Coulomb No images.

14. Coulomb's constant Images.

15. Coulomb's law Images.

16. current-voltage characteristic AKA IV characteristic or IV curve. Images.

17. Del Images.

18. dielectric Images.

19. electrical breakdown Images.

20. electrical color code Images.

21. electrical conductors No images.

22. electrical conduction No images.

23. electrical network Images.

24. electrical discharge Images.

25. electrical potential Images.

26. electrical symbols See the larger table at RapidTables.com: Electrical Symbols.
27. electric arc Images. Also electric arcing.

28. electric charge No good images. Also just charge.

29. electric charge and field Images and animations. Must use Internet Explorer it seems and even then it doesn't seem to work exactly right.

30. electric field (E-field) Images. Or electric field or E-field.
    1. E-field: charged plane Images and animations.
    2. E-field: charged sphere Images and animations. Essentially a point charge E-field.
    3. E-field: dipole Images and animations.
    4. E-field: thin line Images and animations.
    5. E-field: thin ring of charge Images and animations. See Zypman, F. R. 2006, Am. J. Phys., 74, 295, Off-Axis Electric Field of a Ring of Charge.

31. electric motor Images.

32. electric shielding. Images.

33. electric potential Images

34. electromagnetic wave applet Images and animations. Needs Internet Explorer.

35. electron No good good images

36. electron hole Images

37. electrostatics No good images. But there is a whole set of electrical engineering lectures online, but without any provenance: see Electrostatics to Ohm's law. Somebody deserves credit, but who? Apparently ASU and Intel.

38. electrostatic discharge Images.

39. electrostatic induction Images.

40. electrostatic precipitator No images.

41. equipotential Images.

42. exponential decay Images.

43. exponential function Images.

44. Faraday cage Images and animations.

45. field emission Images.

46. field lines Images.

47. field mill Wikipedia isn't so good on this instrument, but About Electric Field Mill Operation is better. I gather field mills rely on electrostatic induction to measure time-varying electric fields.

48. fluorescent lamp Images.

49. galvanometer An analog ammeter.

50. gas-discharge lamp Images.

51. Gauss's law Images.
    1. electric flux through a box.
    2. electric flux through a general surface and sphere are equal.

52. graphite Images.

53. hot cathode Images.

54. incandescent light bulb Images.

55. incandescent light bulb filament Images.

56. inductor Images.

57. internal resistance No images.

58. inverse-square law Images.

59. ions Images.

60. Kirchhoff's circuit laws Images.

61. laser printer Images.

62. Leyden jar Images. Virtually the earliest capacitor.

63. lightning Images.

64. lightning rod Images.

65. linear equation solver Does calculations.

66. lightning safety Images.

67. magnetoception No images. How birds use the magnetic field to navigate.

68. Michael Faraday Images.

69. natural electrical field of the Earth is about 150 V/m near the surface and points downward.

70. nichrome No images.

71. nickel silver Images. It is an alloy of copper, nickel, and zinc. There is no silver. It just has a silvery appearance. For nickel silver see MakeItFrom: Nickel Silver, but the date may be impeachable or refer to only certain versions of nickel silver.

72. oscilloscope Images.

73. ohm Images.

74. ohmmeter Images.

75. Ohm's law Images.

76. pencil Images.

77. pencil lead Images.

78. RC circuit Images.

79. resistivity Images.

80. resistor Images.
    1. resistor color codes Images.
    2. resistors in series and parallel Images.
    3. variable resistor
    4. potentiameter Images.

81. semi-conductors Images and animations.

82. static electricity with images and explanation of the comb-hair system.

83. television technology Images.

84. thunder No images, but there is an audio that might work in class.

85. triboelectric effect or triboelectrification. No images.

86. tungsten (W) AKA wolfram. Images.

87. vacuum tube Images.

88. valence electrone Images.

89. Van de Graaf generator Images.

90. Water properties: Electrical properties

91. wire gauge See also American wire gauge for a table of values.

92. Wolfram Integrator Does analytic integrals.

93. xerography No images.