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Battery Polarity reversal


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coppellstereo 
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Posted: March 28, 2006 at 1:54 AM / IP Logged  
I just thought of this, couldnt yield a sucessful search query to find the answer:
Electricity 'flows' from negative to positive. Why then do we connect everything to the positive terminal?!
stevdart 
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Posted: March 28, 2006 at 2:25 AM / IP Logged  

Which way does current flows

Build the box so that it performs well in the worst case scenario and, in return, it will reward you at all times.
coppellstereo 
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Posted: March 28, 2006 at 2:50 AM / IP Logged  
Thanks!
'conventional current flow' - current flowing from higher voltage potential (+) to lower voltage potential (-)...in case that helps at all.
so what is another way to describe the other school of thought - negative to positive?
haemphyst 
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Posted: March 28, 2006 at 10:21 AM / IP Logged  
In electron theory, current flow was explained to me this way: current is electrons moving from one atom to the next, without this "movement", you cannot have current. Electrons are negatively charged particles, and they want always to be in equal numbers on an atom. When there is a defecit of electrons, they will try to "borrow" electrons from neighboring atoms to equalize the atomic charges. They will move FROM the area of more electrons (the "more negative" area) to the area of less (the "more positive" area), voila! Current! AND the "negative to positive" phenomenon. The more electrons trying to move at one time from one point to the next, the more current produced. Current cannot occur, as you all know, without a circuit.
The movement occurs once there is a circuit. You CAN have voltage without current - it's called "static electricity". (Technically, a battery sitting with nothing connected to it, is "static" - potential without current) Static is used to describe an excess of electrons in one place or time, without current flow. Yes WITHOUT current flow. Once you make that spark when touching the door handle or while getting out of your car, it is no longer "static", as there is a current flow - the elctrons are equalizing! The spark is proof of this. And while there is no CONTINUOUS "circuit", for that brief instant of time, that is not "static electricity", there is current flowing.
Here appears to be a great little site with easy to understand graphics, yet fairly well described. I bookmarked it, 'cause I liked it so much Battery Polarity reversal -- posted image. . Here is what I searched for... Check out some of the links.
It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."
geepherder 
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Posted: March 28, 2006 at 7:37 PM / IP Logged  

The reason we connect everything in the car to the positive terminal is because 99% of all cars are negative ground.  If your car was positive ground, everything would have to be connected to the negative terminal.  If that were the case, you'd also fuse the negative side instead of the positive side of the circuit.

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stevdart 
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Posted: March 28, 2006 at 9:22 PM / IP Logged  

Damn, haemphyst! you explained that well.

(...I still couldn't explain it, myself, but you linked some good info.  Can't blame anybody but myself if I don't get it!)

Build the box so that it performs well in the worst case scenario and, in return, it will reward you at all times.

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