 James Joule found that if he placed a small
paddle wheel in a bucket of water, he had to apply 772.5
foot-pounds of mechanical work to spin the paddle wheel to raise
the temperature of one pound of water, one degree Fahrenheit.
This has led to very careful calculations that now set this
&quot;universal conversion&quot; between mechanical work and heat
at 778.26 FT-Lbs = 1 BTU. For paddle wheels in water, this is no
doubt true. But what happens if paddle wheels are not used? Is
there another method 