rheostat

Example Sentences

• "[page 309] As the principal use of this instrument is to adjust or regulate the circuit so that any constant degree of force may be obtained, I have called it a Rheostat. […] [page 311] The rheostat, especially under the form last described, may be usefully employed as a regulator of a voltaic current in order to maintain for any required length of time precisely the same degree of force, or to change it in any desired proportion."
• "The temperature was kept constant by taking pyrometer readings at the beginning, after the third set of observations, and after the sixth set of observations, and making slight adjustments in the heating-current rheostats when necessary."
• "Before the days of step down AC toy transformers, there was no way of regulating the speed of the electric train except that the more enterprising model train enthusiasts did use battery rheostats which could be purchased for 50¢ from electrical supply houses."
• "The light in the radio cabin was very dim, the rheostat of the angled table lamp had been turned down until only a faint pool of yellow fell on the scratched metal of the table, […]"
• "[W]e decided we needed to carry our own theatre lighting. […] [H]e looked out for us two very large ancient round lamps with thick 'Fresnel' lenses and tall, heavy stands. To dim these lamps, there was a pair of huge rheostats mounted on a thick ply board, that inspired in the operator a constant fear of random electric shocks at 240 volts of Alternating Current."
• "The world had dimmed a little when she was gone, as if there were a rheostat on the sun and somebody had turned it down, just one notch."