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RE: Terry's Test - Two Manifestations of Charge

Original poster: Jim Lux <jimlux@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>

At 12:11 AM 7/6/2005, Tesla list wrote: 
Original poster: "David Thomson" <dwt@xxxxxxxxxxxx>

Hi Mark,

>
> >spark?
>
> An imperfect conductor that carries more current will be
> hotter than the same imperfect conductor that carries less
> current.  The color of the radiated light follows the
> blackbody radiation theory and Wein's Law:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_body
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wien's_law

>From the black body page: "So, as temperature increases, the glow
color changes from red to yellow to white to blue."

Does this mean the thin purple spark is hotter than the thick
white spark?


No.. I think the thin purple spark is just ionized nitrogen, so you're seeing an emission line from the nitrogen. The white spark is a blackbody radiator, and follows Wien's law.

The temperature of air sparks is fairly well understood to be around 6000K (based on the thermodynamics and energy balance).