It's math and science time with your friend, Chris, the ditsy American living in Korea:
Well, I think I've officially overdrawn on one of my transformers. I was ironing today and after about 20 minutes the transformer started smoking. Luckily, the curtains where mostly done being ironed, but my room stinks. The transformer is out on the porch and hopefully will recover to see another day.
Yet again, something I know but have filed deep in my brain would have come in handy. My transformer is a 220V to 110V transformer at 5 Amps. My iron is 110V, 1700 Watts. TOO MUCH DRAW!
For you non-physics geeks, a quick lesson that I learned long ago from Lance Hoffman, Physics teacher extraordinaire at Stanton. It's all about electric potential, current and work. By the definitions of electric potential (which is voltage) and current (Amperes), work is done at a rate of one watt when one ampere flows through a potential difference of one volt. Which is expressed as such: 1 W = 1 V * 1 A
Meaning that my little transformer should have the potential output of 550W. Yet, I was drawing 1700W. Jeez o'Pete!
Thank goodness I smelled it before I did any damage to the house and hopefully the little transformer that could can make a full recovery.
Didn't we already have this conversation about the 1800W hairdryer?
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