Question

You are using a tester with a light bulb to conduct an experiment to find out if a liquid is a conductor of electricity. But you observe that one of the liquids which is supposed to be a conductor according to your textbook is not causing the blow to glow, even though you have checked that all the connections are fine, and the battery and bulb are in working condition. What could be the possible reason for this?

Answer 1

Hint: Weak conductors are the materials that do not have many free electrons so as to pass current through them and conduct electricity. So this can be the reason for the above question where everything is alright but still the bulb is not glowing in the experiment.

Complete step by step answer:
It is given in the question that all the connections are fine, battery and bulb are also in working condition and also that the liquid is conductor of electricity but still the bulb is not glowing that means there is something wrong in the circuit.
What that can be the reason is that if everything is alright it can be the low conductivity of the liquid conductor which may result in too weak current that flows in the circuit and hence, the current cannot produce heat in the filament and thus the bulb does not glow.
Conductors are the materials which have free electrons in them that allow the current to pass through them and when the electricity is passed through a conducting solution, the molecules of the solution dissociate into ions. And these ions cause electrical conduction through liquid.
But what happens due to low conductivity of a conductor, if a liquid has low conductivity that means it does not have many free electrons in it to transfer and the current does not flow resulting in no conduction of electricity and the bulb does not glow at all or glows very dim.
The liquid can be distilled water which is deionized and does not have salts or impurities for conduction on electricity that needs free charges that are electrons so as to pass current.
Other examples of weak conductors are the number of organic solutions, most animal or fish-based oils, most vegetable oils like coconut oil, vinegar, lemon juice, honey, alcohol, etc.

Note: If the given liquid would have been good conductor of electricity then the reason for not glowing of bulb can be like the bulb is fuse it is not working properly, or the connections are loose in the circuit between the wires, bulb, batteries or electrodes or the batteries may be exhausted.