What is the difference between amperage and voltage?

Answer:

Answer

Amperage, or current, is a measure of the amount of electrons moving in a circuit.

Voltage is a measure of how much force those electrons are under.

In a circuit, say a light and switch in your home when the light is on there there is a voltage across the filament of the bulb that is pushing amperage through the circuit.

When the switch is off there is voltage accross the switch but there is no current flowing because it is "blocked" by the switch.

An analogy that normally helps to illustrate the difference between voltage and amperage:

you have a garden hose, the nossle is closed. you've got pressure but no flow-voltage but no current (amperage). Open the nossle and the pressure in the hose causes the water to flow - turn on the light and the voltage causes the current to flow (amperage)

Answer (in understandable terms)

Voltage is how much electricity there is.

Amperage is how fast that electricity is moving (if at all).

There are other things involved in electricity, electrical currents, etc., but this question is about amperage ("amps") and voltage ("volts").

Here's a good analogy. Imagine you have a bucket and a regular watering hose. The hose is connected to a spigot, or spout (which is the thing where you turn the water on and off by twisting the little handle), but the water is 'turned off' at the moment. And although it is 'off,' it could easily be turned back 'on' by twisting the handle and allowing the water to flow out. Also, the more you twist, the more water comes out.

Don't worry -- this will all tie together. :)

If there was no spigot (sometimes pronounced "spicket") then water would be flowing out all over the place, all the time (until there was no more water), because there'd be no resistance to block it from flowing. That being said, when you're done using a hose and you go to 'shut the water off' (by tightening the handle on the spigot), what you're actually doing is forcing the water to stop flowing because when the handle gets tighter, on the other end of the handle is a little piece of metal that gets forced into the pathway of the water-flow, which in turn restricts how much water can come out; if you tighten the handle all the way, the little metal thing will be completely blocking any water from flowing out -- when the water stops coming out, you've officially 'shut the water off.'

Likewise, if you want to fill your bucket up with water, you'll need to turn the water on, which you accomplish by twisting the handle in the other direction. This, in turn, moves the metal thing away from blocking the water, resulting in a flow (of water) into the hose. Now, you can use the hose to point the water so that it flows into the bucket. And, the more you loosen the handle on the spigot, the more water comes out at once.

This is basically the how amperage & voltage work. Like it says above, voltage is how much -- amperage is how fast. And again, if there was no 'spigot-metal-thingy-blocker' to get in the way, water would be flowing out everywhere; and if you shut the water off, using the 'thingy-blocker,' water stops flowing. Either way, regardless of whether the water is on or off, 'how much' water there is sitting on the other side of the spigot doesn't change (unless you forget to pay the water bill). The same is true for voltage -- the number of volts doesn't change.

What does change is the "rate of flow" -- aka "how fast it's flowing." Amperage can be defined as exactly that: the rate of flow (or current). You can have all the water ('voltage') in the world but if it's not flowing (because the spigot is shut off), and therefore the rate of flow ('amperage') is 'zero,' you'll NEVER fill your bucket (Try it! Put a hose in an empty bucket, and don't turn the water on -- I'll bet you'll find that the bucket stays pretty dry). :)

Ultimately, to sum up, you can think of it like this:

• Voltage is useless without amperage. If it's just 'sitting there' then it's probably not doing much of anything that would benefit you.
  
• Amperage 'doesn't exist' if there's no voltage. How can there be any rate of flow if there's nothing flowing in the first place?

Now (if you haven't fallen asleep already), maybe (hopefully) you can figure out / understand why & how it is that a smoke detector uses a 9-volt battery, while a car uses a 12-volt battery (not much difference), and-- well, you get the point.

Hope that helped.

Answer

think of it this way...

There is a water source like a lake, the lake flows into a river, and there is a dam at some portion of the river and then there is at the end of the line the ocean.

The lake is the source or (Service Connection 120/240) The river is the current (amperage) the dam is the (switch), and the boulders, ravines, and sandbars are restrictions of the flow of water which is (Ohms -Resistance)the ocean is then the end of the line.