How come a battery cannot light all bulbs?

Question

I know this is stupid but how come a battery cannot light gor example a household bulb?

And another question. What does a higher current do to a bulb and what does a higher voltage do to a bulb e.g brightness?

What type of bulb would a 6V battery light?

Thanks. Electricity bugs me.

Answer 1

voltage pumps electricity through a circuit

resistor (eg light bulb, toaster etc) resists the acceleration of of the electricity caused by the voltage

current is a measure of the resultant speed that electricity flows through the circuit

so voltage creates current

A light bulb that is designed for a 240V circuit must be
240/6 = 40 times more resistant than one designed for
a 6V circuit since 40 times more current will flow through the 240V circuit

Increasing the voltage, increases the current, ie increases the flow of electricity, increases the heat dissipated in the wire
so the bulb will get brighter and if it gets too hot it will melt the filament causing the bulb to blow

You need a 6V bulb for a 6V circuit
If you put in a 3V bulb, it will either blow or be very bright
If you put in a 12V bulb, it will be very dull
If you put in a 240V bulb, not enough current will flow to
heat it up

.,.,.,

Answer 2

Battery Light Bulbs

Answer 3

Start with Ohm's Law Voltage = current x resistance = V =IR

And the power relationship P =V^2/R =IV

Now consider a household light bulb rated at 100 W. It runs on 120 V house power (It's AC but lets ignore that for now - it doesn't change what follows). So we can estimate the resistance:

R = V^2/P = (120)^2/100 = 144 Ohms

Ok. Consider your 6 V battery and the 100 W bulb. If you hook them up you get:

P = (6V)^2/(144 ohms) = 0.25 W --> That's 400 time smaller than when the bulb was connected to the 120V source.

So basically, bulbs are made to consume a certain amount of power (Hence give off a specified amount of light) when connected to a specific voltage. If you wanted 100 W of power from your 6 V battery, you'd need a bulb with a resistance of 0.36 Ohms. And the battery amy not be able to produce the current 16.7 Amps necessary to make the bulb light at 100 W.

Answer 4

All the above answers have interesting things to say.

One thing my class tried last year when they were exploring the same issue worked great -- everyone took a D battery in each hand and the whole class held them together end to end (it got pretty cozy) and we were indeed able to light up a 40W bulb noticeably with that crazy arrangement.

If you have a pile of $$ to blow you could actually hook enough batteries in series to make a 120V supply to light up an ordinary bulb, but be warned it would be very dangerous!! 120V DC could kill you -- you'd have to build such a thing with help from an electrical safety expert.

Answer 5

The thickness of the filament in a bulb will determine how much voltage it takes to make it light up. The thicker the filament, the more voltage it takes. So if you have a household bulb that is rated for 120V and you hook a 6V battery up to it, there just isn't enough power to heat up the filament. You buy the bulb based on how much voltage you are going to use to light it.

Answer 6

in a store you can buy bulbs that will light up by batteries. a house hold bulb can only light by a battery of the cars thats the only battery will can..

Answer 7

If the voltage is not high enough, the filament will not glow. The resistance of a a filament actually increases the hotter and brighter the filament gets. Despite that, given a high enough voltage, the filament will burn up. You can do this by applying 12v on a 6v filament. It will glow extremely brightly for about one second. Electricity is wonderful.

Answer 8

Indestructible Tactical LED Flashlight - http://FlashLight.uzaev.com/?gYPN