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Our middle ears even have levers, which match the acoustic impedance of the air at our ear drums to the fluids of the inner ear!
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Levers even exist throughout our bodies, with practically every joint in our body acting as a fulcrum. A bottle opener, for example, allows a person to bend a piece of metal using only the strength of their hand, and other tools, like crowbars and cranes, also make use of levers to make work easier. Levers make many otherwise difficult tasks nearly effortless. On one side of a fulcrum, you apply a small force over a long distance, and the other side experiences a large force over a small distance. The lever, it turns out, is the mechanical equivalent of a transformer. The concept of a transformer goes beyond electricity, however, and chances are that you have used a common transformer throughout your life without even realizing it: the lever. A common use for a transformer is impedance matching because a transformer connected to a load changes the apparent impedance of the load.
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Notably, for an ideal transformer, the power on both sides of the transformer is the same. These transformers are designed to change a high voltage and low current on one side into a low voltage and high current on the other side. Electrical transformers are a common enough sight, either cylindrical canisters on the top of a power pole or large boxes humming on the ground. This brings us to the concept of a transformer. Without going into too much math, the answer to this problem is to make the impedance of the source match the impedance of the load, but reaching that goal can be difficult. In this case, the speaker is the source and the outside air is the load. A simple example of this sort of system would be a speaker sending sound out into the air. The source generates sound ultimately destined for the load, with the goal usually being to maximize the power delivered to that load. Impedance matching is derived from a simplified version of an acoustical (or electrical system) where there are two parts: a source and a load. As a direct result of this, if you wanted to compare two sound waves with the same pressure in both water and air, the wave in air would be considerably more intense than the wave moving through water.Īt this point it would be natural to ask the question “Which is better, a higher or lower impedance?” The answer, though, is “neither.” This is because of a practice known as “impedance matching,” which takes advantage of when the impedance of two different parts are made as close as possible. Thus, a medium with a low sound speed and density (like air) will have a much lower impedance than a medium with a comparatively high sound speed and density (like water). This acoustic impedance is simply the product of the medium’s sound speed and density. Every acoustic medium has what is known as a “characteristic specific acoustic impedance,” which essentially describes the impedance of the material for a generalized sound wave. In a previous article we discussed the acoustic medium, and its importance in how sound travels. And while acoustical engineers may not work with circuit diagrams as often as electrical engineers, understanding the impedance of all of the elements in acoustic network can help us understand otherwise complex problems much more simply.Įlectrical, mechanical, and acoustic systems can all be better understood with impedance. Circuit diagrams are ultimately just maps of impedance, and by knowing what those impedances are, an engineer can understand the behavior of even a complicated system of resistors, capacitors, inductors, and even more complex components.Īcoustic impedance is quite similar to its electrical cousin, but instead of describing how electrons flow when exposed to the voltage of an electric field, it describes how the acoustic medium flows when exposed to the pressure of a sound wave. Impedance holds a special place in electronics, as it is the value that ties together the two most important quantities in an electrical system: voltage and current. It is likely that you have heard the term impedance (or the related term, resistance) when describing electronics.