Voltage, Current, and Power Explained - Laying the Foundation for Basic Circuits | Basic Electronics

[@CircuitBread]

Our Friend of CircuitBread, Ohmite, is supporting this tutorial, making it possible for us to make even more content! We appreciate all they do and recommend you go to www.ohmite.com/ceramic-composition-resistors/ to see what these resistors and other electronic components look like in real life.

[@Roosyer]

Voltage across, current through. Got it, thank you sir!

[@Logan-me3fy]

Seriously, thank you so much. I'm 2 weeks into my Circuits 1 and Digital Logic classes so your channel has been a huuuge help.

[@LittleMan2225]

Great explanation! I had seen people use the water analogy before but it was always more confusing than helpful, not this time.

[@CircuitBread]

Thanks Daniel! I hesitated to use the water example because it's been done so often, but I'm glad I was able to differentiate somehow! 😬

[@HomeStudioBasics]

@@CircuitBread Yes, this is great. I too used the water analogy years back without really understanding fully how it works and this explanation was gold. So if we're using headphones as an example using power from an amp, what inside the Headphone amplifier would be the paddlewheel in the above water analogy? In other words, the amp has voltage potential and also specific power numbers in watts, but what actually drives that power inside the amp? Is it simply the transistor?

[@AwesomeDooshi]

Greetings sir!!! Just wanted to say that out of all the other videos which made voltage and current concepts even more complicating, your video was really very helpful. Thank you very much 🙏

[@ESwitchInc]

Bravo! You're excellent at explaining things in a simple, easily digestible manner!

[@CircuitBread]

Thank you! 😄

[@NikeTao]

The best explanation I ever came across!

[@bradwillard8009]

makes way more sense now, thanks!

[@mayaq8324]

At last a simple explanation, thanks!!

[@Victor-E-]

This great. The water example never used to work for me, but it does once you added the work and power aspect. Thanks!

[@CircuitBread]

Awesome, I'm so glad it was helpful!

[@kero632]

That was so clear and easy to understand. Thanks

[@dhliu9687]

oh my god, your explanation is SUPER SUPER easy to understand : )

[@CircuitBread]

Glad it helped!

[@cubbyhoo]

I have just found your channel and I just want to say your very inspiring and are an exact example of why I want to be an Electrical Engineer. I am starting back at University in Glasgow in two weeks so I am really excited and just wanting to get started. Any advice on some projects I could do in my spare time? Keep it up, your calm methodical style is exactly what I need to hear! Engineering can be a bit intimidating!

[@CircuitBread]

Thanks James, I really appreciate the positive feedback! Good luck at University as well, it should be exciting! To begin with, I'd recommend getting an inexpensive multimeter and an assortment of resistors. A breadboard would also be useful. Then, use a battery and just *mess* with things. Put the resistors together in weird ways, see what happens. Start measuring resistance, equivalent resistance, voltage, and current with your multimeter. Get an intuitive feel for what happens to all of those measurements as you put your circuits together. Touch the resistors and the wires to feel how hot they're getting in different combinations. Expect to melt some stuff and maybe get a spare fuse for your multimeter. After a little bit, start giving yourself challenges of trying to achieve certain voltages or currents using different resistors. I believe that after a couple hours, you'll have a better intuitive sense of basic circuits than you'd get after a couple weeks of class, and your circuit classes will make more sense and be easier to follow. It will also be a launchpad to doing more exciting projects, but for those, I'd just recommend figuring out what interests you and working towards that. Have fun with it!

[@cubbyhoo]

@@CircuitBread wow! Thanks for an excellent reply :) I'll give that a go! I have an Arduino Uno and I'm going through some basic projects with that but I will certainly start on messing around and trying to blow things up! Can't thank you enough for your reply.

[@yazeedmansari9185]

Thank you for this amazing simple helpful explanation. I'm 2nd year student and used to have problems with voltage "across" and current "through" 😂😂. Anyways, keep up this amazing content🔝👏🏼.

[@CircuitBread]

I wonder if that's why it drives me nuts now, because it took me so long to get them straight in the first place! Glad it helped!

[@nikteckreviewsandtips6082]

Wow, where has this channel been all my life in school,. 😭😭

[@skanderbenmrad946]

From Tunisia. Very good exemple. The water. No best to explaining.

[@anjanawijewardhana4759]

This is very simple to understand you're a great teacher 🤟

[@suleimanmuhammedhady1198]

I have been searching for simplest explanation of volt current and watts until I came across your video. It well explained I love your work. One question though Volt vs Amps which most important in solar energy that is in charging batteries. I will be very grateful if you respond. Thanks

[@CircuitBread]

That's an interesting question and one that probably deserves its own video. We know that voltage without current doesn't provide any power. And current without voltage doesn't provide any power. But there's a sweet spot in the middle somewhere. Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) solar chargers can dynamically decide to drop voltage in trade-off for higher current, if that is what yields the greatest power. Or pull less current so that the voltage doesn't droop as much, if that's what yields the greatest power. This is, of course, a huge simplification, but really, both volts and amps are important and the greatest efficiency you can get with solar will likely be found with an MPPT module.

[@armankhan2722]

Great Channel the way of explaining is amazing 👏 I love this channel thank you soo much 😍

[@makfathi52]

Thanks for your passion while explaining this :)

[@rahmatrad4599]

thanks👍good as always

[@andrewgalias8668]

Great explanation 👌

[@billjon2732]

You had a very clear analog that made me understand the relations a lot more thank you very much. 👍

[@CircuitBread]

Thanks for the feedback, Bill!

[@iwantagoodnameplease]

I think that hand zoom should become a signature component of all your videos. Ps I like the detail on the waterwheel of putting the fall where the paddle actually is! What's the electrical equivalent of that in the hydraulic analogy? 😉

[@CircuitBread]

I'm not sure about the analogy but the detail was all the video team (Glyn in this case) - I'll let her know you appreciated her attention to detail!

[@ricp]

Awesome content!

[@CircuitBread]

Appreciate it!

[@nikhilsharma654]

Nicely explained.

[@ggerardlee]

This was a great start for me in understanding. Thanks! One question about the two glasses and the wheel. If the flow of the water remains constant, what will be the effect on the wheel if the glass reservoir is raised higher? Does elevating the supply glass increase the 'voltage' or does it increase the 'amps'? Maybe I am not getting the concept?

[@CircuitBread]

The glass reservoir being raised higher would be the equivalent of raising the voltage, as the water will pick up speed as it falls farther. The flow of the water is remaining constant, which represents the amps. This analogy is pretty good but, as with all analogies, be careful not to try and take it too far or it'll break! I hope that helps!

[@babloovyas1080]

Thank you brother

[@ArcanePath360]

Great explanation. What I often find confusing is when buying components such as a Buck converter, it says 5A and I am left asking "At what voltage?" Because 5A at 12V is different to 5A at 3.7V isn't it? Or am I misunderstanding what amps actually are? I'm been learning electronics for years and building my own circuits, but every now and then I think I've learned something wrong as the more I learn, the less I seem to know.

[@CircuitBread]

You are correct that 5A at 12V is a very different amount of power than 5A at 3.7V. The buck converter *should* say something like, "5A output" and then have the voltage output somewhere. We do CircuitBread as a passion project but for money, we help companies with their marketing. From our experiences doing that, I do have some sympathy for the people trying to sell those things. As an engineer, I want to know everything about it! But you can't fit a datasheet into a title. So, they throw a few, high-level stats out there and expect you to spend some time in the datasheet to get all the details before you actually purchase the part. And I've been an engineer for over 15 years now and while I certainly know a lot more than I did when I first graduated, I also have been learning that there's a lot I didn't know that I didn't know! It's a common feeling, don't let it get you down.

[@ArcanePath360]

@@CircuitBread So I'm right to question it? I'm finding more and more products are listing like this and even people on YT say things like "This wire will only carry 1 amp" and I'm always thinking "AT WHAT VOLTAGE????" - because the 2 are a symbiote. One doesn't exist without the other. They should be saying the wattage it can handle. When I asked the ebay seller the Wattage output on a buck converter that was 5-35V 5 AMPs, he said it could output 75watts. I believe he may have pulled that number out of his proverbial.

[@danialmohammadian5335]

thank you so much, for your explanations.👌

[@tedbastwock3810]

Volts across it > volts in it ... amps more important than volts ... great points, loving this Learn Basic Electronics playlist. FWIW I think you should have emphasized the volts across it thing more, I think that would help a lot of people. Thanks for all your work, I really enjoy it!

[@Transitooooor]

without high volts eg above 20V amps ain't going to hurt you. Grab hold of a car battery 12V which can produce up to 600 Amps you will feel nothing. On the other hand high voltage and very low amperage can kill you.

[@rollemup77]

good electrical class

[@daz41262010]

fantastic analogy :)

[@florinegheorghiule2286]

Very good explanation. Thank you very much and please do more videos. All the best.

[@CircuitBread]

Thanks for the feedback, Florine! We plan on moving forward with a lot more video in this series and several other series. Hopefully they're all helpful for you. Take care!

[@florinegheorghiule2286]

Greetings from Ireland. Good luck with all you do for us. God bless.

[@jaybeltran5616]

Hi there I an Electrical engineer here in the Philippines and I was inspired with all of your videos. I wish to ask what software or app you use for your animation and what video maker you use to make your videos .I wish to make a teaching video as well to inspired my fellow Filipinos. Hope you can help me. Regards

[@CircuitBread]

Hi Jay! We use the Adobe Suite, so Aftereffects for the animations and Premiere for the video editing. We rarely use Blender for more advanced 3D effects as well. Good luck, I look forward to seeing what you create!

[@jaybeltran5616]

@@CircuitBread Thank you so much, I am currently reviewing my lesson to take my licensure board examination, you're videos really help me a lot. Thank you so much

[@CircuitBread]

Good luck on the exam!

[@meercalane200]

What exam board are you teaching in all your videos?

[@CircuitBread]

Exam board? Not sure what you mean by that.

[@meercalane200]

@@CircuitBread I mean is this a level wjec eduqas? Or Aqa??

[@zachteti885]

Isn't voltage bi-directional? How does that get worked into cup of water analogy?

[@zachteti885]

Current*

[@CircuitBread]

Great question! It is definitely bi-directional - in the water analogy, it's simply that you are raising the other cup higher and the water flows back into the original cup. One of the issues we have with this analogy is that we sometimes show the bottom cup as being empty, which isn't accurate. In reality, that cup already has water and if it were higher, the water would flow from that cup to the other cup. To make the analogy even more accurate, we should add some more addendums and caveats but I think this is enough detail to understand the general concept.

[@georgerussell2947]

why do you use energy and voltage interchangeably? i thought voltage was energy per unit charge.

[@CircuitBread]

Could you tell me where those were interchanged? I didn't actually make the connection between voltage and energy in this video as I thought it would be more confusing than helpful at this point.

[@reverie477]

Energy and voltage cannot be used interchangeably. Voltage IS energy per unit charge (V= E/Q)

[@ukiy01]

clever channel name

[@shantahalder9061]

Oh, thanks thanks thanks

[@billrussell569]

Thank you!!

[@wildanrizkylazuardi4553]

i'm in my final year of studying EE and want to understand the basics again ahaha

[@CircuitBread]

Oh yeah, tell me about it... as we're going back and creating these, it has been an excellent refresher for us as well!

[@wildanrizkylazuardi4553]

@@CircuitBread i'll support you guys in making the content by becoming your subscriber, do you planning on making videos about instrumentation as well? If yes then i'll be happy to learn those as well XD

[@CircuitBread]

A little on tools and we might do more on oscilloscopes, signal generators, etc but... that's not really the priority at the moment. Unfortunately, I'm still trying to catch up on some things but I'm hoping that soon I'll be able to get a bit more productive again and start pushing out tutorials a little quicker.

[@eugenioarpayoglou]

What about negative voltage?

[@CircuitBread]

Voltage is all relative! So, negative voltage is just voltage below what we've arbitrarily assigned as ground. For the cup example, if we assume the desktop is ground, or 0 volts, then anything below that would be a negative voltage. That being said, we could say the floor is ground, the desk is 10V and above the desk is 20V. Or that the desk is 0V, above the desk is 10V, and the floor is -10V. It's all about the relationship between the points.

[@NolanHOfficial]

I had to watch this for school.

[@skyrat2594]

What are amps?

[@CircuitBread]

Hi Brayan! Amps is a measurement of the movement of electrons, the unit we use to describe electric current. One amp is the equivalent of one coulomb of charge passing a set cross-section in one second. And a coulomb is a little more than 6x10^18 electrons (a lot!) Hopefully that's what you were looking for, thanks!

[@joeborovina4769]

TY!

[@lebdesmath2510]

tyvm

[@justinreschke3642]

I calibrate micro-ohm meters that output up to 500 amps of current. Every time I operate them I take a step back probably for no real reason other than a fear of all that current 😂

[@CircuitBread]

Arc flash is real! I doubt you're dealing with the voltages that could cause that but I also just figure better safe than sorry. 😬

[@gcg9056]

not sure i understand the term 'across' verse 'through'

[@much_tunsia]

So English isn't my native language but it does make sense because in case of voltage you kinda have two terminals or two points that has different potential, a point where electrons have potential to flow and another were the electrons are welcomed, the word trough makes you feel like it's the same value of potential as long as that part of wire

[@johnculjak1798]

Just like gravity.

[@محسنالسرياقوسي]

thanks alot

[@chloes1308]

you're my bestfriend now tyyy

[@CircuitBread]

Glad to hear that!

[@l-boy_Prime]

Tnx

[@robertbatista50]

My pet peeve is hearing the term “current flow”.

[@emanofficial3547]

I LOVE YOOOOOOU

[@srikumar9963]

Doesn't it occur to all of you that power (so called V*I) and a bunch of factors provided to us is only to make sure that we can get so called money for using the voltage for a certain amount of time ? Use voltage which is to make sure we can transfer electrons from one place to another through resistance of a material ?? , use "I" which is not required at all ??? If more electrons are used, number of electrons consumed = power. (Figure out this into money by people who're giving this to us and not give us all the rest of factors?????) We all know that using 110V is the possibility or what is being presented to us as the possibility for so called electrons to start from ? Observe something to work from based on reference model and then from there start with the atomic model ?? Entire periodic table itself created based on observing how many different objects are there and then come up with a bunch of table with rows and columns saying so many electrons are there ? 😀😀

[@madness3714]