Need some comment from electronic people about wattage

[240meowth]

Okay, here's the thing i'm confused about, which one will consume more power?

A 120v AC 60watt bulb

or

a 12v dc 60watt bulb

because they both consume 50watt but shouldn't the 12v one take less somehow?

I'm confused, because I'm trying to go energy efficent around the house w/ 12v lamps...

[TheSnail]

I took a class called "DC circuit analysis". The teacher had a crush on me so I passed with an A without doing anything. But as much as I learned in that class, My bets on DC for conserving energy.

[radhaz]

I'll lend a hand.

Okay, here's the thing i'm confused about, which one will consume more power?

Power is measured in wattage, so basically this is a trick question because you give us two specs and they both consume the exact same amount of power ie 60 watts. As for the AC vs DC of the bulbs, I've never had the opportunity to swap an AC and DC bulb of the same specification. In a macgyver like pinch I have used an AC bulb in place of a smaller dc bulb and it worked albeit dimly but it did work.


A 120v AC 60watt bulb

or

a 12v dc 60watt bulb

because they both consume 50watt but shouldn't the 12v one take less somehow?

I'm confused, because I'm trying to go energy efficent around the house w/ 12v lamps...

I can't really summarize electronics theory into a short paragraph but I will make a feeble attempt at it to help you along the way.

Electronics work in a very balanced relationship of give and take i.e. take away the voltage and the amperage has to go up. This relationship is defined as "Ohm's law" and without nuking the hell out of this I will leave you with the breakdown of your two bulbs.

The 120v 60w bulb would use .5 amps of current and 240 ohms of resistance
The 12v 60w bulb would use 5 amps of current and 2.4 ohms of resistance

You can see the relationship begin to take shape with the decimal places shifting. If you are truly interested in electronics I encourage you to search the net for information on Ohm's law or even kirchoff's (sp) law to explain this better. There are some real easy ways to remember the laws and there relationships for figuring things out on the fly (PEIR) Best of luck!

[Powered by Jay]

60watts is the power consumption. If you want to go energy efficient go for the fluorescent light bulbs instead of the incandescent. They consume less than half the power. I believe the 20w fluorescent is equivalent to the 60watt incandescent.

[240meowth]

I'll lend a hand.



Power is measured in wattage, so basically this is a trick question because you give us two specs and they both consume the exact same amount of power ie 60 watts. As for the AC vs DC of the bulbs, I've never had the opportunity to swap an AC and DC bulb of the same specification. In a macgyver like pinch I have used an AC bulb in place of a smaller dc bulb and it worked albeit dimly but it did work.



I can't really summarize electronics theory into a short paragraph but I will make a feeble attempt at it to help you along the way.

Electronics work in a very balanced relationship of give and take i.e. take away the voltage and the amperage has to go up. This relationship is defined as "Ohm's law" and without nuking the hell out of this I will leave you with the breakdown of your two bulbs.

The 120v 60w bulb would use .5 amps of current and 240 ohms of resistance
The 12v 60w bulb would use 5 amps of current and 2.4 ohms of resistance

You can see the relationship begin to take shape with the decimal places shifting. If you are truly interested in electronics I encourage you to search the net for information on Ohm's law or even kirchoff's (sp) law to explain this better. There are some real easy ways to remember the laws and there relationships for figuring things out on the fly (PEIR) Best of luck!

Sweet, so basically since power is calculated in wattage, a 120v 60w bulb and the 12v 60w bulb essentially use the same amount of power?

Say, since the 12v requires an ac to dc transformer would you say it takes up more power than?

[radhaz]

Using a power transformer will take up more power, stick with AC and like Powered by Jay said, look at using the flourescent bulbs for energy effeciency.