Electronics

124 cards. Each one is a 40-second story with a five-minute read behind it. Page 3 of 3.

The hard part of a circuit breaker is killing the sparkOpening a switch sounds simple, yet pulling two contacts apart while a large current flows makes the electricity leap the gap as a glowing arc. Left alone, that arc can vaporise m…
Designing an electronic circuit starts with boxes whose insides are ignoredBefore an engineer picks a single resistor, a new circuit usually exists as a diagram of empty boxes. Each box states a job, such as amplify, filter or power, with no thought yet …
Why shops once sorted gadgets into black, brown and white goodsWalk into an American electronics shop decades ago and the radios, televisions and stereos were black goods, named for their dark casings. British sellers called the same things b…
The diode is an electrical one-way valve with a two-path nameA diode lets current flow one way and all but blocks it the other, much like a check valve in plumbing. That humble trick turns household alternating current into the steady direc…