Re: Voltaic Pile of Confusion

[brian whatcott <inet@INTELLISYS.NET>]

At 16:17 7/29/00 -0400, Tom McC asked:
> ... What is the best way to view how the
> electrons all achieve a specific voltage in an arrangement where x batteries
> are hooked up in series.  In other words, how is an electron produced in one
> battery affected by the presence of another battery?
>
> Thank you in advance.
> Tom McCarthy

A model which can be assimilated at any level considers electrons in
metals as billiard balls which need to negotiate an array of obstacles -
lets call them nails.
   If we fill a pipe with such balls and arrange a u bend at each end
so they can turn round, then some paddle pushing on the balls
and applying a constant force produces some average velocity along the pipe.

The balls would accelerate but the obstacles remove their kinetic energy
by collision, which heats the pipe and its obstacles.
 Though the paddle moves the column of balls only cms per second, it is
found that at the far end of a 100 meter pipe of this kind, the balls are
seen to start moving within one tenth of a second.

 If a second paddle is added in order to double the force applied, the balls
move twice as fast (almost) so that if we count the number of balls passing
a point as a the current, we say the current  approc=xinmately doubles with
the motive force.
brian whatcott <inet@intellisys.net>  Altus OK
                Eureka!