Re: re Mineral Spirits (water conductivity)

• To: tesla-at-pupman-dot-com
• Subject: Re: re Mineral Spirits (water conductivity)
• From: "Jim Lux" <jimlux-at-jpl.nasa.gov> (by way of Terry Fritz <twf-at-verinet-dot-com>)
• Date: Sat, 27 Feb 1999 13:35:10 -0700
• Approved: twf-at-verinet-dot-com

 
> Original Poster: Chris Tominkson <internetinbox-at-yahoo-dot-com> 
> 
> I heard from my oceanography teacher that pure water, just one
> Hydrogen atom and 2 Oxygen, don't conduct electricity. He said that it
> is the minerals and other stuff in water that conduct electricity. So
> could you use distilled water for poly-rolled caps?

This one comes up pretty often.. especially because water has a dielectric
constant of 82, making for a lot of C in a small volume.

Sadly, water isn't actually an insulator. If you put DC on it, it does
conduct, as the water is electrolyzed into hydrogen and oxygen. However,
for short pulses, it is an insulator, so it is used in fast transmission
lines with HV pulses (like the Sandia Z-machine, for instance).

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