Just been raking through my parts bins and found a couple of rolls of silver wire marked 'Constantan' - i was looking for nichrome (sp?) the heating element stuff.
Anyway - what is this constantan stuff and what is it used for?
i googled it and it appears to be a copper/nickel alloy for strain testing, but i dont understand how it would be used.
Dunno, but we use nichrome wire in our chem lab because it dose not heat up and give color during flame testing of other metal salt compounds... Not sure why I bothered to mention that. Bored I guess.
Just been raking through my parts bins and found a couple of rolls of silver wire marked 'Constantan' - i was looking for nichrome (sp?) the heating element stuff.
Anyway - what is this constantan stuff and what is it used for?
i googled it and it appears to be a copper/nickel alloy for strain testing, but i dont understand how it would be used.
Constantan wire has a TEMPCO (temperature coefficient) of zero, meaning its DC resistance doesn't change with temperature, which cannot be said of most any other electrical conductor.
Constantan wire has a TEMPCO (temperature coefficient) of zero, meaning its DC resistance doesn't change with temperature, which cannot be said of most any other electrical conductor.
Wow, did not know that. Makes sense though, Constantan as in constant. It just goes to show ya, never to old to learn something
I can't imagine what material would have 0 temp coeff. All metals react to temp don't they? I will have to look that one up... Not to imply I don't believe rather, I wish to know more.