What the HECK is a Phasor? Alternating Current Explained.

Alternating current is kind of wild. Electric charge drifting back and forth, governed by wave mechanics. But what if I told you there's a better way using imaginary numbers and the complex plane? It's called a phasor diagram.

Nick Lucid - Host/Writer/Editor/Animator
Vanessa R Bradley - Thumbnail
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TIME CODES

00:00 Cold Open
00:32 Why Rotation?
01:08 Types of Current
02:30 Root Mean Square (RMS)
03:58 Current is a Response
05:01 Complex Plane
06:18 Phasors
07:33 Phase Angle
08:19 Summary
09:05 Outro
09:29 Featured Comment
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Corrections:

04:22 Oops! The image there is a capacitor, not an inductor. My bad!

[ScienceAsylum]

*Side Note:* At 1:54, I say alternating voltage is used in our power grid because it's more efficient over long-distances. That's true because we can use transformers to raise the voltage up to the 100s of thousands. That drastic increase in voltage lowers the current by the same factor. Less current means less energy loss (P = I^2 R). Transformers don't work on direct voltage, so you're stuck with whatever voltage you originally generated. That voltage will have to be whatever is needed at the load (120V or 240V or 480V), not the 100s of thousands of volts that gives us good transmission efficiency.

[erichodge]

I'm 63 years old, and I want to be like Nick Lucid when I grow up.

[kmatlockii]

I've been binging all of the old SA videos, and I've got to say: not only am I impressed with how good they are early on, but also with how much they've gotten even better. Nick can explain anything now!

[alexanderquilty]

I’m so glad you made this video. As a EE major, you made me feel 100% less insane.

[slgnssp]

I studied physics for years and today it was finally revealed to me WHY ohm is represented by omega. Everything makes so much more sense now.

[MrTheBigNoze]

Wow, this explains it a lot more clearly than I ever got during my only electrical engineering course. I remember using formulas to calculate phasors and I had no idea what was going on. I've been with this channel from the beginning and it keeps getting better and better. Keep up the awesome work!

[apbosh]

Note: Multiplying the RMS value by sqr Root 2 (to get Peak Voltage) will only work properly for a sine wave.
Great topic! Thanks

[LiborTinka]

Our physics teacher told students they are "phase shifted" when they took noticeable time to respond to a question. Now I know what she meant.

[markwhi]

I appreciate that Star Trek Clone got so much screen time to make up for phaser disappointment :D

[nmay]

I ask that you NEVER lose that human connection in your videos where you cut to yourself laughing at a joke or struggling to pronounce something, etc. It is essential to this channel :)

[freddievargas]

Me taking a semester to understand RMS
Nick: explains it in like 15 seconds in the cleanest way possible

[Llorx]

I LOVE that you add subtitles manually instead of relaying on YouTube detection system. I'm not used to listen to english and sometimes is a bit hard for me to understand someone when talking at normal speed. Thank you, really.

[stevemonkey]

My mind is almost actually blown by having this stuff explained in such a simple way.

[throwawayuser]

Man, I admire other YT channels for their depth of factual understanding.

I admire yours for your depth and clarity of hard to understand topics into simple analogies while keeping a fluent pace. You indeed justify your last name, Lucid


Keep it coming. From an Indian viewer.

[kakalimukherjee]

When I was little I would imagine that because alternate current is oscillating, the same electrons would be drifting back and forth in the wires around the same location for an eternity. I used to give names to the electrons in a little wire I had. I'd like to hear Nick's opinion on that XD

[Lucky]

8:20 They certainly make the math a LOT simpler -- it's _really_ convenient to be able to solve a comparatively simple algebra problem rather than a differential equation. I don't even remember exactly how phasors let us do that, but I remember being _really_ grateful for them in Circuits 1 last year. Euler's formula in general has _so many_ useful applications.

The one thing I don't like about bringing in complex numbers is that it's a giant pain to solve a system of equations with complex valued coefficients -- it's way less involved when there are only "real" numbers. But then if we didn't use them we'd just have to used vectors and rotation matrices instead, which are just a more complicated way of doing the same thing anyway. 🤷

[JeepX]

Well, well. I could have used this info 40+ years ago during my basic electronics training in the air force. Finally makes sense now! I've been living a lie all these years! Great job!

[rexarnold]

I’m in a trade school (HVAC) this really helped me understand how electricity works thank u professor X !!!!

[Tomwesstein]

I simply love how he completely dresses up in star trek uniform for a 5sec shot, it makes these videos so enjoyable. And the topics are always interesting. Happy moment when a new vid releases or I find an old one I somehow haven’t seen yet

[robertokane]

You know its a good Wednesday when you finish work and see a new video from Science Asylum released 12 seconds ago. Keep up the good work Nick.