Question:
I am sort of confused as to the difference between amps and volts. I
know that with very few amps you can take a lot of volts (such as the 5000 volt
10 microamp power supply we have....you cannot feel anything when you hold d
on). But, what are the two of them. Everyone that answers this question just
seems to confuse me more! Thanks.
Replies:
Amps and volts measure totally different things. For example, particle
accelerators usually have starting sections with voltages in the
millions of volts, but if that section of the chamber does not have
any particles to move and create a current, the "Amps" are zero.
Voltage measures a "desire" for charged particles to move, while
current (number of amps) measures the actual number of charged particles
that are moving (per second past any point).
As an analogy, imagine you are driving to the superbowl in your
car. There are tens of thousands of other people out on the road
too, heading in the same direction for the same reason. The "Voltage"
here is the desire of all these people to get to the stadium.
The "current" is the speed with which they are getting there,
which could be pretty small if traffic was really bad.
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