In misc.industry.utilities.electric wrote:
| Jonathan Ball wrote:
|
|...Take a 1-foot cube, 1 x 1 x 1. The volume is 1 cubic
|foot, and the surface area is 6 square feet. An n x n
|x n cube of 2 cubic feet will have n = (approx) 1.26.
|The surface area is 6 x 1.25^2 = 9.52 sqare feet. The
|volume has doubled, but the surface area has gone up by
|LESS than twice.
|
| A lovely explanation, but larger tanks lose more heat.
|
|Not relative to volume.
|
| Who cares about volume?

Those who care about how it is relevant.


|The RATE of heat loss is based on the ratio of the
|surface area to the volume, and because the larger
|vessel has a SMALLER ratio of surface area to volume,
|it will lose heat at a slower rate.
|
| I'm afraid you are wrong, my good man. The rate of heat loss
| (vs temperature change) is directly proportional to the amount
| of surface. This is known as "Newton's law of cooling."

But you are totally ignoring the system. Pick a volume of water.
Now pick between having one large tank, or many smaller tanks.
Guess which one losses less heat.

It really is a matter of being proportional to volume.

--
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| Phil Howard KA9WGN | http://linuxhomepage.com/ http://ham.org/ |
| (first name) at ipal.net | http://phil.ipal.org/ http://ka9wgn.ham.org/ |
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