Re: HVAC questions

[cliff parker <cparker@CHARTER.NET>]

> > However when hot air is unconfined in the atmosphere what acts as the
> > surface of the balloon?
>
> Key idea:  Air is a fluid.  It has a pressure everywhere.
> Pressure is not something that happens just at surfaces.
>
> Each parcel of fluid pushes on the neighboring parcels
> of fluid.

I knew this and was thinking something along these lines.  I have difficulty
visualizing this idea.  Pressure equals force per unit area.  Seems like a
surface is an necessity.

Interesting ideas in your website.  I intend to read it more thourouly.  One
statement said that each air molecule collides with one or another of its
neighbors 10,000,000,000 times per second.  How is something like this
determined?


> Again: P = (N/V) kT
> Same pressure, same temperature ==> same number
> per volume.  Then less mass per particle ==>
> less mass per volume.
>
> The H2O molecule is a lot less massive than N2.
>
> Humidity rises for the same reason a helium
> balloon rises.

Would unconfined helium rise just as well as confined helium?


> At ordinary temperatures, you would need a
> container many miles high in order to see
> much fractionation of the atmosphere.  (And
> you would need to suppress convection, etc.)

Doesn't this last statement conflict with the previous idea that the less
massive H2O rises to the ceiling of a room (much less than many miles high).


> This posting is the position of the writer, not that of Brown,
> Einstein, Smoluchowski, or Nernst.

I like your disclaimers.

This posting represents the questions of the writer and very likely those of
Brown, Einstein, Smoluchowski, Nernst and Denker at some time in their life.

This posting is the position of the writer, not that of SUNY-BSC, NAU or the AAPT.