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Electricity and Basic Electronics
Activities
1. Visit a plant that makes transformers or
inductors. How do they wind the coils?
Why do these components cost more
than resistors?
2. Make a list of the places you fi nd
transformers around your house.
3. Some neighborhoods have a device that
looks like a large gray can attached
to their telephone poles. These are
transformers. What voltages do they
produce?
4. Why do industrial plants operate so
much of their equipment at 460 V instead
of 120 V?
5. On what voltage do the large
electromagnets found in junkyards
operate?
6. Why do power companies clear the area
under all the high tension transmission
lines?
7. How is it possible to run power
lines underground without fear of
electrocuting people walking over them?
8. The coil on a car is another type of
inductor. What would it look like if you
cut it into two pieces?
9. Can you make a radio without an
inductor?
10. What kind of wire is needed to make an
inductor or transformer? What would
happen if the wire were not coated with
insulation?
11. How are transformers encapsulated?
12. If the core of a transformer came apart
while it was in operation, what would it
sound like? What would happen to the
transformer?