Re: electrocution experiences

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "Jason Johnson by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <hvjjohnson13-at-hotmail-dot-com>

Wow, its been a long time since I last posted....

I have been near electrocuted several times, mostly from stupidity;

The first time was about 2 years ago, the very first time I ran my MOT coil
(the first revision, only original things that still remain are the
esecondary coil & transformers). I had just finished it, and it was to big
to run  inside so I pulled it outside while it was still fairly light. I
fired it up and much to my delight I saw beautiful 2 foot long arcs, though
they were faint because of the light. I got in a little closer to look, and
to my surprise the 2 foot arcs were quite a bit longer than I had thought! I
was shocked on the right arm and it went out my right foot, no burns or
serious damage.

Second time was when I took 6500volts at about 650 uA (micro-amps, not
milliamps) straight across the chest, due to a bad spot in the insulation of
the wires I was using.

The third and worst time, by far, was when I got ahold of 120 right across
the chest and tripped the 15 amp breaker. I was tinkering with an old motor
someone had just given me, the insulation on the cord had been fried and was
brittle enough to crumble right off the two sides of the wires when I
grabbed them. Vaporized the 16 gauge copper in the cord, left two nice burns
in my hands, and tripped the breaker REAL hard. All I really remeber was a
brilliant white flash, pain, and then me standing in a large cloud of smoke.
I was very, very lucky, somehow the burns didn't even require a trip to the
doctors, and no other damage.

Another time I found out the hard way that microwave oven capacitors
predating 1970 have no bleeder reistor in them. Theres still a dent in my
steel locker from my elbow coming backwards VERY fast.

Also concerning bleeder resistors, I discharged an 8kv 2ufd through my left
hand due to failed bleeder resistors. There were no burns, it just blew two
small holes in the skin and looked like a scar for about 2 weeks.

Lessons learned:
Never trust bleeder resistors
Never trust insulation thats older than you are (slight exaggeration)
Never underestimate your coil
Never operate a coil in conditions were you won't be able to see the sparks


<< Jason R. Johnson >>
G-3 #1129
The Geek Group
http://www.thegeekgroup-dot-org/

"The two most common elements in the universe are hydrogen and stupidity."
 -Albert Einstein