I work with equipment that operates on three phase electrical circuits. I can’t get my head around the concept of “phases.”
In: 17
If you start way back at the generator there are 3 stators and a rotor. Essentially the 3 conductors or “phases” are just extensions of this. From generation to transmission to distribution. Phase A at your house is connected to the phase A stator on the generator. In fact every phase “A” on the interconnection is connected like this and synchronized. The rotor in each generator is a magnet with flux lines that pass through the stator to induce ac current forwards and backwards (depending on if the north or south pole of the magnet crossing the stator) producing a sine wave. Gens can have different numbers of poles in their rotors but the rate change relative to the stator is the same producing synchronized waves. Each phase or stator is 120 degrees apart and changes 60 times a second in North America.
We use three phase power because it’s the best bang for the buck. There were other numbers of phases tested back in the day but this became the standardized format.
Sorry for the grammar I’m high AF.
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