[dorkbotsea-blabber] Electricity and human power

[Chuck Wolber]

On Tue, 29 Jul 2008, Seth! Leary wrote:

> Something is fishy. Who is right? Am I completely wrong in my 
> thinking...or math?

Are you using "large calorie" or "small calorie". Food calories are 
measured in "large calorie" or kilo-cal increments. Or in other words, one 
small calorie (the amount of energy required to raise the temp of one gram 
of water by 1 degree C) is equal to 1/1000th of a Kcal. Thus that 90 
calorie snack can raise 90,000 grams of water 1 degree C ;)

If there were ten bulbs (just guessing) and they are 60 watts each, then 
you have 600 watts. So to get those bulbs burning at rated power for one 
hour, you'd have to output 600 watt-hours of energy. One Kcal is 1.163 
watt-hours. Based on my math, you'd have to burn 515.9 Kcals (600/1.163) 
over an hour's time to produce enough energy to get those bulbs to burn at 
full output for an hour. To get them to burn at full output for a mere 
second, you'd only have to burn 1/3600th of that many calories, which 
comes to a mere .143 Kcal. So... if you were able to push 2 calories into 
those pedals over a period of one second, you'd probably blow those light 
bulbs right out of their sockets...


..Chuck..


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