How a lawn mower works
How a lawn mower works
There are a number of different kinds of lawn mowers but they all have one thing in common; They all have sharp blades that cut grass. Rotary mowers do not have an engine and the blades are attached to the wheels in some manner. When you push the mower, the blades turn and clip off the tops of the grass blades.
With a motorized lawn mower, whether it’s a push mower or a riding lawn mower, and engine is involved. One or more blades is attached to the underside of the mower and attached directly to the motor causing the blades to spin very fast. As they spin the cut the tops off the grass blades. The height of the blade can usually be adjusted a number of different ways, but it usually involves lowering or raising the machine so that the blade sits higher or lower. This can make it very easy to adjust the height of the grass, since some people like to have grass that is shorter than others.
The blades are long pieces of steel with a sharpened edge. In order for the blade to cut the grass properly, it’s important to keep the blades sharp so they cut through the grass easily, rather than ripping it out of the ground, which will damage the grass.
How a steam iron works
How a steam iron works
A steam iron is an important item to have, especially for those that must dress in a professional manner for their careers. Depending on the type of fabric to be ironed, the iron has a number of different settings which regulate the amount of heat and steam that is allowed. For light materials that are quite fragile, the iron will be heated to a lower temperature.
What a steam iron does is heat water that is put into the iron, which in turn produces steam which helps to remove wrinkles in fabric. There’s a heating element inside the steam iron that can heat the water quickly. With the high temperature, has soon as the water hits the very hot plate on the bottom, steam is produced.
When you “press” your clothes with a steam iron, not only are the clothes flattened by the weight of the flat iron and the force you apply to it, but steam is also produced. Water does have the ability to corrode metal, but steam irons are made with a metal plate that is water resistant.
Overall the process is quite simple, but very effective in making your clothing wrinkle free.
How Air Conditioning works
How air conditioning works
On a warm summer day you want your home to be cool and comfortable and this of course requires an air conditioning system. Whether it’s central air conditioning or simply an air conditioner installed in the window or the wall, they both work very similarly.
Generally what is happening with an air conditioner is that warm air is being pulled into an air conditioning unit, cooled and returned to the room. Much like refrigerator, a compressor cools gas or refrigerant and compresses it, which in turn causes it to become warm. The warm gas then runs through some coils and during this process the gas turns into a liquid. As the liquid is forced through a valve called an expansion valve, the liquid evaporates and becomes a very cold gas which absorbs heat. This process is a continuous process and then the air in your home is made cooler as the warm air is absorbed.
Whether you have a central air system located outside or another type of air conditioner, the process works the same. The gas is often referred to as “freon” and some forms of it have been known to harm the environment, soto much care is taken by technicians when a leak is found, so that it minimizes the amount of gas that escapes.
How Central Heating works
How central heating works
It’s nice to come home from work or school to a nice, warm house isn’t it? Most homes today are heated with central heating systems, which help to distribute heat throughout the house.
A gas boiler located in your home is supplied with flammable gas from your local gas utility provider. An electric switch ignites a fire inside the boiler, usually located in the basement of your home, if you have one. This fire is used to heat water that is stored in the boiler to a temperature of about 60 degrees Celsius. Once the water is heated to this very hot temperature, it’s forced through pipes that distribute the water throughout your home to radiators located in each room. These radiators get very hot and heat emanates from them, causing the room to warm up. In order to keep hot water constantly flowing throughout the pipes in your home, a pump is attached to the boiler to push the hot water out to the pipes and radiators.
In order to turn the heat on and off and regulate the temperature, a thermostat is located somewhere in your home. This allows you to set the temperature at a comfortable level and it monitors the temperature. If it gets too hot, the boiler will turn off, but if the area where the thermostat is located gets cold, the boiler will turn on by itself to warm the area.
How a Fridge-Freezer works
How a fridge-freezer works
We all do it – Stand in front of the refrigerator looking for something to eat, but it’s not often that we think of how it actually works.
The basic premise behind how a refrigerator works is quite simple, but how it actually accomplishes this is a little more complex. What a refrigerator does is evaporates liquid in order to absorb heat. A fridge-freezer has a number of parts that allow this to happen. First a compressor inside the fridge-freezer compresses gas or refrigerant and pushes it through coils which cause the gas to turn into a liquid. As the gas, which has now turned to liquid is pushed through an expansion valve, it goes from high pressure to low pressure, which causes it to evaporate. This evaporation is what absorbs and heat, causing very cold temperatures to emerge. The refrigerator portion of the unit is slightly warmer than the freezer section as the process can be regulated to make the temperature warmer or colder.
In order for the fridge-freezer to work properly it’s important that all the coils on the back of the unit are free from dust and dirt, which can affect the cooling of the refrigerant or gas used in the fridge-freezer.
How a Gas Boiler works
How a gas boiler works
Gone are the days when you had to chop wood endlessly in order to heat just one single room in your home. With today’s new heating systems that use a gas boiler, you are able to heat your home without all the work that older systems had to deal with.
A gas boiler located in your home is supplied with flammable gas from your local gas utility provider. This boiler is filled with hot water from your home, usually from a hot water tank located in your home. This is the same hot water thank that heats the water that comes out of the tap when you turn it on. In order to keep this water hot though, gas is burned and it keeps the water in your gas boiler hot so that it can be distributed throughout the house in pipes.
Most heating systems have thermostats so that when the temperature in the house goes up or down, the heating system responds. With a gas boiler, the water being stored in the boiler itself will cool down and so quite regularly, the gas will ignite once again automatically to make sure that this water stays very hot so it’s ready to heat the home.
How a Camera works
How a camera works
Today we have digital cameras and only a few years ago, most of us had film cameras, but it’s unlikely that you’ve given much thought to how they actually work.
The most basic explanation of how a camera works is fairly simple. First, a camera has a component called a lens which is simply a piece of glass or plastic that is curved. When the camera is pointed at an object, light beams bounce off the glass and flow through it, recreating the image in front of you. The glass is curved to allow the light to hit at an angle, making all the different light beams hit the film.
The film is a chemical that is able to record different levels of light received through the lens. Once the imaged has been recorded on a film, it then needs to be combined with other chemicals in the developing process to produce a picture.
This of course is a very simplified explanation of how a camera works and for the average person is as much as you will need to know. Those with scientific backgrounds will of course be able to give a much more detailed account of how a camera is able to take a picture.
How a Washing Machine works
How a washing machine works
It’s hard for some of us to believe, but at one time, clothes were washed by hand, using a washing board. A modern washing machine works much differently and makes washing clothes a breeze.
When you decide what type of clothes you will be washing (ie. Colors, whites, denim etc) you fill the washing machine with the items and select the appropriate cleaning cycle. What happens then is that water begins to fill the washing machine. Once the water gets to the designated level, a motor begins to move the barrel back and forth, causing the clothes to rub together. The barrel or tub that the clothes are in is controlled by a powerful electric motor. This action along with the soap that you added cause the clothes to become clean.
Once the washer has agitated for a few minutes, then the water is drained, and clean water rinses the soap off. In order to dry the clothes, the motor that operates the barrel begins to spin very fast, causing much of the water to disappear down the drain. While the clothes won’t be dry, they will be much drier than if the spinning function never happened.
How a Dishwasher works
How a dishwasher works
Maybe you can remember the days of spending a great deal of time cleaning up after each meal. Washing every plate, dish, glass, knife, spoon and fork was a tedious task, but there weren’t really any other options, until the advent of the dishwasher.
For many the dishwasher has become an appliance that you simply cannot live without, but do you know how it works?
When you turn your dishwasher on, the first thing that you will hear happening is the dishwasher filling with water. The entire dishwasher does not fill up, just a basin fills and then it heats the water very hot. Once the water has reached approximately 130 degrees Fahrenheit, this water is pumped through jets and it’s sprayed out onto the dishes. The water is forced out of small holes, which make the water pressure quite powerful and the water is sprayed out of bottom and top rotating jets, ensuring all dishes are properly cleaned.
After the dishes have become wet, the soap is released and the dishwasher sprays the dishes for a certain amount of time. The dishes are then rinsed with clean, non-soapy water and if you have the dry function on, the dishes are warmed. The inside of the dishwasher becomes hot, using heating elements that look much like heating elements in ovens. Once the wet dishes get hot, they dry quite quickly. Some people choose to turn this function off in order to save money on electricity.
How a Microwave Oven works
For most of us the Microwave has become one of the most important appliances in our homes and it gets plenty of use. Whether it’s for re-heating leftovers or for cooking, the Microwave is certainly one of the handiest inventions of the past century.
So how does a Microwave manage to cook your food so quickly? Microwave ovens use a radio waves which are conveniently called “microwaves”. They use a 2.5 gigahertz frequency radio wave that get absorbed by water, fat and sugar causing atomic motions, which in turn makes the heat. Microwaves are not absorbed by the containers that we use to heat on or in such as ceramic or plastic, but metals reflect microwaves, which is why it’s advised to never put metals of any kind in the microwave. Microwaves heat food in a different manner than traditional ovens. With an oven, heat is administered on the outside and has to work its way inside, while microwaves heat the food all the way through at the same time because the radio waves can penetrate the food.
Microwaves do have a harder time forming any sort of hard crust though, mostly because the temperature inside the microwave is still at room temperature and only the food itself gets hot.