RE: high voltage measurement w/ divider

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

Original poster: "Lau, Gary by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" <Gary.Lau-at-hp-dot-com>

While there are plenty of things to be careful about when working with high 
voltages, let's not spread alarm where none is warranted.  Exploding wires 
occur when pulse caps are discharged into (essentially) short circuits.  A 
resistor in a divider network going open (or even if one were to short) 
could not result in currents sufficient to explode anything.  The worst 
that might happen is your meter may fry somewhat.

Gary Lau
MA, USA

 >Original poster: "brianb by way of Terry Fritz <teslalist-at-qwest-dot-net>" 
<brianb-at-antelecom-dot-net>
 >
 >Guys,
 >
 >Be careful. A failure of one resistor here will most likely cascade down the
 >string turning all the resistors and associated wiring into an exploding
 >wire experiment with shrapnel flying everywhere. Carefully think this
 >through and provide plenty of safety margin before proceeding...
 >
 >If you want to see what an unexpected failure scenario can do check out
 >http://www.briananddebbie-dot-com/images/Backyard%20Science/Quarter%20Shrinker/A
 >ccident/accident.htm
 >
 >Regards,
 >Brian B.