Giga is simply a prefix that means "times 10 to the power of 9". This is x 1000,000,000, 1 with nine noughts. The Flux Capacitor therefore uses 1210,000,000 Watts.
Electrical Power = Current x Voltage
(Watts) (Amperes) (Volts)
P = I V
This power is generated in a nuclear fission reaction using Plutonium, a radioactive element. It has a chemical symbol Pu and consists of 94 protons, 94 electrons and 150 neutrons. It is therefore number 94 in the Periodic Table of Elements. It does not seem to occur naturally ie. it is artificially prepared.
The car has to travel at 88Mph so that it can travel instantaneously through time. Converting this into standard scientific units, ie. per second and metric, that gives us a velocity of:
141592 Mph = 39.33111 m/s
(Funny how the English invented Imperial units and are giving them up, yet the U.S. are still using them!)
Flux Capacitor
Of course there is no such thing as a "Flux Capacitor" in the real world [It would be pretty cool if there were though!!!:) ]. This was confirmed by my rather bemused Physics teacher when one of my class mates asked if there was such a thing as a Flux Capacitor. There seem to be Back to the Future fans everywhere.
Capacitor
A Capacitor is a store of electric charge. Basically a large charge (measured in Coulombs) is stored over a certain amount of time. It is then all discharged in a fraction of the time is took to store the charge. This releases a large amount of energy in a very short time.
This is also how a camera flash works. The capacitor stores the energy which is released in a fraction of a second for a big flash. That's why you need to wait for a while between each photgraph for the flash to work.
The energy for the discharge is:
E = 1/2 QV
where E is the energy in Joules (not Jules Verne!!)
Q is the charge supplied in Coulombs
V is the voltage in Volts.
P = E
t
Power = Energy delivered
time taken
Power = energy used by Flux Capacitor
time
