this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2023
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Strange Planet by Nathan W. Pyle
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What's really funny? All thermometers are calibrated using 0°F
Add ammonium hydroxide to ice water and the mixture will always be 0°F. Everyone calibrates their thermometer this way.
I very much doubt a celcius thermometer would be calibrated in farheneigt in a country where people don't use this metric, but you gotta convince yourself I guess.
Then you don't know how to calibrate thermometers.
You can't use boiling or freezing water. The boiling and freezing point of water changes based on pressure.
Any mixture of liquid water, frozen water, and ammonium hydroxide is 0°F at any pressure (assuming it itself isn't boiling or freezing), which you can then calibrate to STP with a bit of math.
Interesting! I bet you need a second point for calibration though. It would be funny if it was boiling water, i.e. 100°C.
You'd half to take elevation into account. It's 100°C at sea level. For every ~150m (500ft) you go up in elevation, you should expect the boiling temperature to be about 0.5°C less.