Geo spake thus:

On 15 Oct 2006 09:24:45 -0700, "
wrote:

For the BD's to heat up like this with literally no input signal,
shouldn't they have to conduct a large DC current instead?

Yes - if you have 0.5 volt across the resistor then there is 1 amp flowing all
the time and with 50 volts available you are dissipating 50 watts of heat.

Say what? My arithmetic gives me 1/2 watt (0.5 V @ 1 A).


--
"In 1964 Barry Goldwater declared: 'Elect me president, and I
will bomb the cities of Vietnam, defoliate the jungles, herd the
population into concentration camps and turn the country into a
wasteland.' But Lyndon Johnson said: 'No! No! No! Don't you dare do
that. Let ME do it.'"

- Characterization (paraphrased) of the 1964 Goldwater/Johnson
presidential race by Professor Irwin Corey, "The World's Foremost
Authority."