#554 overall
The Chemical History of a Candle
YouTube
1 recommender · 1 thread · recommended in 1 year, 2017 · score 1.0
A lecture series based on Michael Faraday's 1848 Christmas lectures for children, explaining the chemistry and physics of a burning candle. This YouTube playlist presents Bill Hammack (The Engineer Guy) delivering the lectures.
Commenters call it a truly excellent lecture series despite its age, noting that it keeps Faraday's original language, which takes some getting used to.
Recommendations by year
20062026
Two videos I'd like to share (well, one video, and one playlist)...
The first is a 'flashover simulator'. This is a training tool for firefighters to help them recognize the signs of a 'flashover'. A flashover occurs when the radiant heat of the fire is sufficient to cause pyrolysis and ignition of more or less every surface in the room simultaneously (the floor, furniture, etc).
I'm mostly sharing this because sitting in one of these is where it first clicked for me that fire burns gasses, not solids. Watching the fire snake lazily through the smoke overhead, until it felt like I was sitting on the bottom pool, looking up at the surface.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Z4xxObrTlI&t=40s
The second is Bill Hammack (The Engineer Guy) delivering Faraday's lecture series on The Chemical History of a Candle. This is a truly excellent lecture series, despite its age (they did choose to keep most of the original language, which can take a little getting used to)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0INsTTU1k2UCpOfRuMDR...