[TheForge] Shop Lighting

[Bruce Freeman]

That is also my understanding.  Just as for lightning, the arc through the fluorescent tube breaks down some the nitrogen inside to ions.  Those ions conduct electricity much more easily than unionized (hmmm, that's UN-ionized, not UNION-ized) nitrogen.  Meanwhile, the ionization/recombination of the nitrogen emits UV radiation.  The UV strikes the fluor on the inside of the glass, and the fluor re-emits the light in the visible wavelength.

BTW, if you have a prism or diffraction grating handy (and you can use a piece of an AOL CD for the latter) you can make a simple spectroscope.  This will enable you to actually see the colors in any light source.  Incandescent light is a continuous "rainbow" from red through violet.  Sunlight is the same, except it's missing the "spectral lines" where hydrogen and helium absorb.  Fluorescent light consists of a number of spectral lines, and is not at all continuous.  Interesting, if you want to play around with it.

Bruce
NJ

>>> grover.richardson at gtri.gatech.edu 2/28/2006 4:05:47 PM >>>
Possibly I used the word arc in correctly.  The gas inside the tube, hhmm,
plasma??  Is that the correct word?  It conducts.  When it conducts, it
drops the Voltage across the gas, the Voltage dependant upon the length of
the gas column.

Don't worry about threatening you with physics, I'll  hide also<G>.