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The filament in a light bulb (the part that glows bright) is usually made from a metal called tungsten which has such a high melting point that it can heat up as electricity is passed through it and give off light without melting at the high temperatures produced. However, at high temperatures, tungsten can also burn - so if a current is passed through the fillament under normal conditions, it will heat up, glow, but because it is so hot, it will react with the air around it and either vaporise or burn, becoming useless. To prevent this happening, the filament is enclosed in a glass bulb. In the bulb all the air is removed and another gas is put in instead. In cheap bulbs this is usually nitrogen, but more often the gas used is argon. Neither of these gases will allow burning, and so the filament can glow brightly when electricity is passed through it without the risk of it burning. However, if the glass bulb is broken - or even if it is simply cracked - air containing oxygen can get in and so when you switch on the bulb the hot filament burns away rapidly blowing the bulb.

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15y ago
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11y ago

The circuit is broken. The filament gives light due to its resistence to the flow of electricity. The trick Edison had to discover was something that would conduct electricity BUT not easily BUT wouldn't burn out too soon. Tungsten seemed to be the answer. Since bulbs don't burn up, (immediately) they're incandescent.

Incandescendent bulbs are still pretty inefficient, giving about 95% of their energy off as heat, not light. They're being replaced by light emitting diodes.

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14y ago

because the moment the filament is broken, the electrical circuit is broken. its the actual filament that glows, so, no filament, not light

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6y ago

With a broken filament, the bulb is dead. It needs to be replaced with a new bulb.

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Q: Why doesn't a bulb work when the filament inside is broken?
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Continue Learning about General Science

What is the general resistance of a tungsten filament?

The resistance of the filament in a light bulb is(voltage at which the bulb is designed to operate)2/(the rated power/watts of the bulb)


The wire inside an electric bulb is known as the what?

This was called a filament and was found in older electric light bulbs.


Can you give me 2 fact about the incandescant light bulb?

-It's a very old technology quickly being replaced by newer more efficient technologies. -The light produced in the bulb is created by electricity heating up a filament inside the bulb creating light. This wouldn't be possible without the bulb however, since oxygen would quickly end this reaction of the filament through oxidation.


What are incandescent bulbs?

An incandescent light bulb is your common household bulb. It is best identified by the presence of a filament (the thin piece of wire in the center of the glass bulb that glows when turned on.) The incandescent bulb's interior space is a vacuum (all the air is removed) so that the filament doesn't burn up. It produces a warm, slightly gold/yellow light. A "florescent" bulb, on the other hand, has no filament. It works by electrically exiting gas in a long tube creating a cool white light with almost the same color as the sun.


Why is bromine a gas inside a working light bulb?

Trace amounts of halogens such as iodine and bromine are used in halogen lamps (bulbs) to prevent the evaporation of ionized metals from the filaments of the bulbs. A chemical reaction with the halogens returns vaporized metal (such as tungsten) back to the filament. The result is reduced darkening of the bulb interior and a longer bulb life at hotter filament temperatures. Compounds containing bromine are mixed with non-reactive noble gases in quartz halogen bulbs.