Well nex... this is my gcse explaination.
When you heat anything up, it has a boiling point right?? Beyond this it becomes a gas. Right??
In a solid the molecules are like:
0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0
Hard to compress, they are already rigid against one another. In a gas the bonds between the molecules have broken down and the molecules float about like: (but occupy the same physical area, presumably)
Yeh... well the gaps in between the molecules can now be closed up and the same number of molecules compressed into a smaller volume.
Someone will definitely correct me... and this was the way my chemistry teacher taught us... he was rubbish!!
