How does a heater warm a whole room?
Heat's Triple Journey
How does a heater warm a whole room?
You flip the switch, and the heater glows orange. Five minutes later, you're warm — but you're standing across the room. The heater didn't walk over to you. So how did the warmth get all the way over there?
Heat travels three ways, and your heater uses all of them like a relay race. First up: conduction. The heater's metal coils get scorching hot — over 1,000°F. That heat conducts straight into the air molecules that bump against the coils, making those molecules jiggle faster. Fast-jiggling molecules ARE hot air.
