Electrical Circuits Class

HVAC School - For Techs, By Techs

Bryan Orr

Training, Careers, Airconditioning, Self-improvement, Hvac, Business, Education, Refrigeration, Heating, Ac, Apprenticeship

4.8 • 985 Ratings

🗓️ 7 November 2017

⏱️ 42 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This podcast episode on electrical circuits is a class recording. In it, Bryan discusses transformers, ground, common, and line vs. load sides of a circuit.

Transformers use induction to pass alternating current signals to electrical appliances. Alternating currents (AC circuits) are tricky because the current switches direction each time. Therefore, the current flow is difficult to visualize because the direction keeps changing. Electrons naturally want to go to the other side of the transformer, not to ground. So, we have to connect both sides of the transformer to ground to send electrons to ground. (In this case, ground refers to the metal body of equipment, not the earth.)

A "short" is an undesigned path, typically taken at high current due to low resistance. The high current can blow fuses and cause equipment failure. Therefore, we connect to ground to prevent that high current from taking paths that will cause equipment failure.

The part of the circuit that we call "hot" is on the line side of the switch. That part is the line that goes into the switch. The part of the line that leads from the switch to the load is called the load side. After the load, we have "common" or "neutral." When common is connected to ground, it will be electrically the same as ground. However, it's worth noting that "common" can mean several different things in electrical. (Typically, we call common "L2" in high-voltage circuits with multiple phases, "neutral" in 120v circuits, and "common" in low-voltage circuits.)

Bryan also discusses:

The downsides of memorizing wire colors for making connections
"Common" misconceptions
Switch types in electrical circuits
Thinking of connections as a switch and load
Various terminals and wires

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Transcript

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0:00.0	The free training provided by the HVAC School Podcast is made possible because of the generous support from our sponsors, Testo, Rector Seal, and Carrier.
0:17.0	Condensate Overflow switches are very much under considered in both maintenance
0:25.6	situations, service calls, and in installations. Technicians they get used to
0:30.4	installing them one particular way and then that's just they want to apply that
0:33.9	rule to every single switch that they run into and different applications require
0:37.4	different types of switches even in the unified mechanical code.
0:40.0	Rector seal is a leader when it comes to condensate overflow switches.
0:45.0	They have the safety switch, they have the easy trap, and they also have the aquagard lines all under
0:52.0	rector Seal and they all make different products that serve different purposes.
0:55.4	They have products that have the trap already installed that you can clear out and you can see the entire trap.
1:00.9	Even with the safety switch, the SS1, which is a switch that we've used for years, they came out with a clear-bodied version.
1:07.0	So you can actually see what's in the switch, which is pretty cool.
1:10.0	We use a lot of the SS2s, a lot of the SS3 pan switches.
1:13.2	They just have a really wide broad line and when you look at AwaGuard,
1:16.5	AwaGuard has some really neat innovative products.
1:18.7	They have one float switch that you can actually unthread the cap from the bottom in order to get the water out and check the float,
1:24.5	which is a nice design.
1:26.0	So there's a lot of different products that you can get through Rector Seal in the condensate
1:29.7	switch category, but the one thing that I want you to think about is next time you open up one,
1:34.0	so say you open up a safety switch, the SS1, read the manual because you'll find some things that you maybe
1:38.2	didn't know, like for example, that the float is adjustable.
1:41.6	You can actually adjust the height of the float to suit the application and that alone
	...

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