Physics II / Steady Currents and Circuits
Practice question · True or false

The terminal voltage of a real battery equals its EMF only when it delivers no current.

Hints
  1. What does the internal resistance do once current flows?
  2. It drops I times r inside the source itself.
Show the answer

True

Why

True, the terminal voltage is EIr\mathcal{E} - Ir, which equals E\mathcal{E} only at I=0I = 0. This is why a tired battery reads fine on an unloaded meter and collapses under load.

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