4 ms·
19 comments and not even one mentions that Watt, with a capital W, measures power, and not energy? I'm assuming 90% of posters know this, but it still bugs me.
by estomagordo 11y ago
19 comments and not even one mentions that Watt, with a capital W, measures power, and not energy? I'm assuming 90% of posters know this, but it still bugs me.
A modest proposal: "What 50 kilowatts of RF power sounds like through a jumper cable"
- Nutmog 11y agoI think that usage is OK. It's like saying "40W of light". In this case, it tells us there's some RF energy and also that it's RF energy of the "50 kW" type.
- estomagordo 11y agoI think "40 W of light" is a great example of why this imprecise, or quite frankly, incorrect usage is troublesome. 40 W of old timey lightbulb light is useful if you want to sit close and read a book in the evening, whereas 40 W of a modern LED bulb light is a great thing to have if you want to fend of a pack of marauding undead.
- klodolph 11y agoIt's not actually as imprecise as it sounds. A 40W light bulb might produce 1W of light and 39W of heat. Watt is the normal unit of measure for radiant flux, and the lumen is nothing more than "luminous flux" which is radiant flux weighted according to its spectrum.
- zurn 11y ago"40 W of light" in physics terms is quite unambiguous, it means 40 W in radiant flux.
- estomagordo 11y agoI'm aware that it makes sense to talk about light flux in terms of Watts, I was more getting at it not being obvious what the person using that terminology actually means.
- gpvos 11y agoWhich is certainly not what the average person on the street means when they use that term.
- 50CNT 11y agoThis may be slightly off topic, but look at this cool LED[0]! It's a 150W 18000lumen LED, which is the raddest thing ever. [0][http://www.cree.com/LED-Components-and-Modules/Products/XLamp/Arrays-NonDirectional/XLamp-CXA3590 http://www.cree.com/LED-Components-and-Modules/Products/XLam...]
- jacquesm 11y ago> What 50 kilowatts of RF power sounds like through a jumper cable And you still got it wrong.
- xupybd 11y agoThis reminds me of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg_yzRWy9HM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gg_yzRWy9HM
- zurn 11y agoWhat's wrong with it?
- jonsen 11y agoMaybe he thinks it should be 'kiloWatts'. CamelCase impairment?
- matthiasl 11y agoI can't see the problem either. I don't think it's a capitalisation problem; when using 'Watt' as a name, e.g. James Watt, you need to capitalise. But the unit is 'watt', with a lower-case 'w'. The symbol is an uppercase W. Reference: Table 3, in "NIST Special Publication 330: The international System of Units (SI)", Taylor et al (2008). Nor do I think there's a problem with confusing energy and power, as there currently is in the original title. So, what's the problem? Jaquesm's "And you still got it wrong" comment is unhelpful because it doesn't identify a specific problem. Maybe he feels that the sound doesn't actually come from the cable. Or maybe the cable isn't carrying 50 kW. I don't know. Maybe there is an obvious problem I'm missing.
- sathackr 11y agoI believe it's actually the arc producing the sound, otherwise the cable would make the noise regardless of the presence of the arc. Whether that's what jacquesm is referring to or not, idk.
- jacquesm 11y ago