Smart Home Terms and Measurements

I am writing this page, especially for our website users who may need clarifications and understanding of the measures that are mentioned in our articles. Of course, we hope that this will be of help to anyone else who may look for such information. Even though I will try to present very accurately from the scientific point of view, my goal is to show things as simple and practical as possible. 

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Pascal – Pa 

Vacuum gauge
Vacuum gauge

Pascal is a measure for pressure. The scientific definition is: Pascal1 is a pressure of one newton per square meter (to make it more confusing, in the International System of Units, a Pascal is one kilogram per meter per second squared)

In more simple terms, the Pascal is measuring how hard something pushes on a surface. Think of a 

something like pressing a button on a bell. But in practical application, the Pascal is used to measure pressure in gasses and liquids as well. For example, the air you blow in a balloon will create pressure on the walls of the balloon, which will make the elastic walls of the balloon expand. The air pressure in tires is very common as well. 

When the pressure becomes negative, the pressure inside an area is lower than outside.  We call that suction and commonly we see its effect in vacuum cleaners. 

To give an idea about the practical range of measure we encounter on our day-to-day, the normal pressure of the air surrounding us, which we call atmosphere is 101.325 kPa (it is read as Kilo Pascal), which is 101,325 Pa. 

A car tire pressure measures around 220 kPa or 220,000 Pa, for which a more common unit of measure is 

Equivalent with about 32 PSI (pounds per square inch)

The suction of a household vacuum cleaner is in the range of 20,000 to 30,000 Pa and the robot vacuum suction goes in the range of 2,000 Pa to 5,000 Pa (or more for the high-end models up to 8000 Pa)

  1. Britanica Pascal Unit Of Energy ↩︎