[Closed] Ever given yourself an electric shock?

Only on a pig fence and that was not fun!

"you live and learn don't you?"

clearly not, in your case...

[pedant]you can't [b]live[/b] and learn from electrocution, only electric shock[/pedant]

And yes, several times, but mostly not mains. Car ignition systems are my main area of expertise lol.

A couple of times on animal fences.

Once on the flash capaciter in a camera I'd dismantled. That knocked my arm backward and made my thumb tingle for a few hours.

pissing on electric fences will render them useless, you should try it? 😉

If you had truly electrocuted youself you are doing a fine job of posting as you would be dead.

e·lec·tro·cute (-lktr-kyt)
tr.v. e·lec·tro·cut·ed, e·lec·tro·cut·ing, e·lec·tro·cutes
1. To kill with electricity: a worker who was electrocuted by a high-tension wire.
2. To execute (a condemned prisoner) by means of electricity.

yup, sheep fences and cow fences on purpouse as a kid,
240V mains twice, accidently. "saved by the breaker" on both.

I once tried to change a lightbulb in the dark and felt with my hands for the two prongs inside the light fitting to marry the bulb to.

Won't be doing that again!

:S

mains electricity, up a ladder, leaning over a large glass panel
.
thankfully I didn't fall off and die
someone was smiling on me that day

I once saw an exposed light switch cable when i was in some toilets in Moscow, just hanging out the wall, turned to a friend to pretend to get an electric shock and grabbed them - yes, you guessed it, they were actually live and I my friend quite rightly thought i had gone insane.

Thanks for picking me up on electrocution, lol!

I have changed the title of the thread accordingly.

Yep. Mostly mains. Our house was (well, still is) old. Spent the first year gutting it all out and rewiring and plumbing it.

You get complacent after while. I was fitting new wall sockets etc leaving the ring main live. Every now and again though I'd forget and....WHACK!

Not majorly so, but once I decided to take apart a tiny 4.5" CRT telly whilst it was working to see what the stuff inside it did. I thought I'd be safe because it was only running off 12V. I did not know much about how tellies worked! (there's a high voltage transformer inside for the CRT) - gave my hand a hell of a belt but nothing bad.

Then another time on a different telly, got a similar shock whilst taking the aerial lead out of the back. Weird this - it never did it again despite me trying to reproduce it.

My dad electrocuted himself many times over his years teaching sparkies in the tech college. It usually got a big cheer from the students 🙂

My mum gets the prize though - as a student she was replacing the fuse on a table lamp, and she thought she'd try it out before putting it back together, just in case. Well the socket was on, and she pushed the plug in with the palm of her hand. Blew her across the room, apparently. Or more likely the current forced her to shove herself across the room.

Yes, was fitting new ceiling light in the porch/hallway. Turned off downstairs lighting circuit. put screwdriver to metal. Got punched in the chest by a 200lb fist and found myself sitting on the floor with no idea how I got there.

Then turned off all the downstairs circuit and all the upstairs circuit. Same thing happened again.

Obviously, the hall light was on the boiler circuit.

My whole body trembbled/buzzed for the rest of the afternoon. Not nice at all.

I get a little zap most times i get out the car. Bit annoying.

when youve done it once on the main, it should be a pretty good deterent not to do it again! was for me!

unwiring light fitings in a big warehouse.all were switched off i was told...unfortuatly two were switched else where and the bulbs were also blown.
buzzzz! moral of the story...switch the leccy of yourself!
as a teenager on a two stroke bike that wouldnt start. my brother said, stick a screwdriver in the ht cap and look for a spark.i did exactly as he said....and held the shaft of the screwdriver while i kicked it over! christ that makes you jump.great days.

Yes, was fitting new ceiling light in the porch/hallway. Turned off downstairs lighting circuit. put screwdriver to metal. Got punched in the chest by a 200lb fist and found myself sitting on the floor with no idea how I got there.

Then turned off all the downstairs circuit and all the upstairs circuit. Same thing happened again.

You should probably invest in one of these

[img] [/img]

Yeh loads of times. I used to work as a mainenance engineer in a hotel and we sued to change the faceplates on broekn sockets live, got quite a few buzzes from doing that. We also used to do some plumbing work 'live' because we couldn't find the valves - changing washers on teps, etc. Fortunately we didn't do the faceplate/plumbing live work in the same location at the same time. As you can guess this was before the days of H&S.

Got a belt off an electric fence keeping the cows in at the bottom of Le Plenney in Morzine. I bent over to take my leg armour off and my arse touched the fence. Quickest I'd moved all day.

Also had a couple of mains belts after my esteemed and more experienced colleague had managed to turn back on the circuit I was going to working on.

As you can imagine I make damn sure it's off and locked these days.

Yep, electric fence man tests as kids all the time.

Servicing office water coolers, wet hands a mains supplies is not something I'd be trying to do twice.

molgrips - Member
Then another time on a different telly, got a similar shock whilst taking the aerial lead out of the back. Weird this - it never did it again despite me trying to reproduce it.

:lukeb:

Yes, was fitting new ceiling light in the porch/hallway. Turned off downstairs lighting circuit. put screwdriver to metal. Got punched in the chest by a 200lb fist and found myself sitting on the floor with no idea how I got there.

Then turned off all the downstairs circuit and all the upstairs circuit. Same thing happened again.

Obviously, the hall light was on the boiler circuit.

This is why I always turn of the main house supply when ever I touch anything electrically related in the house. You can never be 100% sure how things are wired up (especially in a house as old as mine!).

yup. my economy 7 switch unit failed so i had a look and it just looked like it needed flick back into position. so i removed the cover to get at it and touched it . i was then hit with the force hammer in the shoulder and thrown back into the wall ;-( when i got off the floor i called out the electrician.

turns out the bit i touched was where it comes into the house from outside and was very powerful lol i also blew something in the local substation by doing it and quite a few in my area had no electric for a few hours the electric board came out to chat to me ;-( dumbass lol

the electrican said i was lucky i still had my fire service safety shoes on ;-)tho i was still a dickhead

I used to like licking 9volt batteries.

A few years back I used to help a mate who used to do loft conversions and while we were clearing the loft out to put the new joists in there was an old bit of cable laying there grabbed it and yep it was live, the jolt made me step back and I missed the joist and my leg went through the kitchen celing.

As a kid I had various encounters with electric fences as we lived on a farm the worst being a shock to the face trying to get a sparrow out of a water trough. I don't think I've been right since..

I used to like licking 9volt batteries.

In addition, does how wet the ground is effect the shock you get off an electric fence? I remeber one in Ireland on a rainy day being particularly vicious.

Aside from the obvious danger (and it's not something I'd risk for kicks) am I the only one that found getting a full-bore whack of the mains not unpleasant?

Not sure whether it was just general glad-to-be-alive-ness, but I felt quite euphoric afterwards...

My mum gets the prize though - as a student she was replacing the fuse on a table lamp, and she thought she'd try it out before putting it back together, just in case. Well the socket was on, and she pushed the plug in with the palm of her hand. Blew her across the room, apparently. Or more likely the current forced her to shove herself across the roo

proably before breakers, so on a fuse? toooo slowwww...

Guy who did my electrical training told us how he was getting grief pat testing items on a site, so used a ring main tester to see how the house was wired.
[img] [/img]
turned out the earth was live.
which is scary enough, but consider, that the metal chassis on ALL items is earthed, so things like electric heaters, were insulated from the user by a thin skim of cheap paint.

and the earth isnt run through a breaker i dont think?

I used to like licking 9volt batteries

Yes, used to do that too.

Remember the days of using a cassette recorder to load computer games? If you took out the lead from the computer, put it on your tongue and pressed play, you got a nice tingly tongue.

proably before breakers, so on a fuse? toooo slowwww...

A fuse wouldn't have blown anyway - only a few milliamps going through her body no? Otherwise she'd have died. Not clear whether or not the current went to earth.

Yup, a couple of times I've pulled plugs out of sockets and reached too far round the pins and got a shock. Didn't feel too bad, but not pleasant.

Plus, irritatingly, something about the trainers I wear to work and the floor material mean that I'm forever getting static shocks as I walk round the office...

Trying to sort an old storage heater late one night. Was merrily fiddling with the stat. Clock ticks over to 1:00am when the Economy 7 came on. BANG. Woke up the couple downstairs. Like being smacked with a big stick.

Brother went through a phase of amatuer electrics during his teens. We had an old steel framed sofa. Underneath ran the lead to an old table lamp. Deciding to rig up an attic light, my Brother unplugs the lamp & removes the lamp from the cable, leaving it underneath the sofa. Mum came in, sits down & plugs in the lamp. Remember her shooting bolt upright. We used to call it the electric chair from then on.

On a sadder note, a lad we knew threw a branch from a foot bridge over the West Coast Main Line. It landed on the 25kv line below. Fearing a train crash (he was only 10), he decides to remove the branch & climbed over the bridge railings. I was about 100m away in the adjacent park, but my best friend was stood on the bank watching. First we knew was a huge bang, ground shook & a flash. Remember the smell, & seeing this twisted form on the tracks below, hair & clothes on fire. Poor kid.

I got a shock from an electric fence while looking for a shortcut through some fields doing a Scout challenge hike. I also had a penchant for licking 9v batteries & once licked a scalextric track & pulled the speed gun thing. That really stung & left two burnt lines on my tongue for a few days.

Never been shocked by mains though.

yep, several times

as a small child I saw my parents poking the fire, interesting when we got mains electricity and electric fire ....
also, slightly older, Xmas, Scalectrix, plug wired, too impatient, didn't screw plug top on...., pushed it in with my hand flat on top of it and did a double backward roll across the room, as all the lights went out ...

I now always touch stuff with back of hand till I'm sure..

An oldie but a classic

As a kid, my dad brought home a hand dynamo for charging field radios. Family sat holding hands in a ring with it while he wound it up - just to see who'd let go first!

[looks skyward and smiles] Thanks dad!

[i]I the only one that found getting a full-bore whack of the mains not unpleasant?[/i]

Yeh especcially when I had a hangover.

[i]We had an old steel framed sofa. Underneath ran the lead to an old table lamp. Deciding to rig up an attic light, my Brother unplugs the lamp & removes the lamp from the cable, leaving it underneath the sofa. Mum came in, sits down & plugs in the lamp[/i]

I don't understand this, how could your mum plug in the lamp if it was 'my Brother unplugs the lamp & removes the lamp from the cable'?

I'm confused.

Too many times. Once in the science lab at school - if you put 6V through your braces (the orthodontic kind), it hurts.

Once swapping a fan in a PSU, which for some reason I didn't think about disconnecting. Put my thumb tip across two contacts on the back of the IEC by accident.

Once from a toaster that was plugged in, but switched off at the wall.

The toaster and the braces were the worst - it seems to me that where you get a shock is as important as what the voltage is.

I think I win - although I haven't read all the above posts.

As a youngster I worked as a landscape gardeners assistant, and we had a job to top a very tall hedge of trees at the bottom of a garden in Donaghadee in Northern Ireland. I held an aluminium ladder while my boss topped some slender growth at the tree top - it had obviously been pruned before. One of the branches managed to go over and touch an 11,000 volt overhead powerline.

My boss got blown of the ladder and ended up stuck in an adjacent tree (er, lucky) and I just got sore arms. NI electricity had to attend as we tripped the local sub station.

Long runs of coax can hold a charge even when disconnected.
let the work placements coil them up. heheheh!

as a kid i used to put 9v batteries on my tongue , been caught by cattle fences and while cleaning my tropical fish didnt see the broken glass on the heater , **** me that hurt , my arm must have reached 50mph in a milli second 😳

I had about a week of constantly getting really nasty static shocks off everything a few months ago - first one was off a DVD player, and then every person or thing I touched for a few days seemed to give me a shock. Is there a boffin type who could explain this? I've got my fingers crossed for some super powers related answer...

harryflashman - ditch the nylon undergarments.

ditch the nylon undergarments.

😆 I don' think I own any. But if this is the beginnings of newly found superpower, I think nylon undergarments might be compulsory.

I stick my finger in a light socket when I was a kid because I had been warned to be careful with electricity and I wanted to see how much it really hurt. A lot.

"I felt quite euphoric afterwards"

well it certainly wakes you up, but a coffee would be my first choice. 🙄

get loads at work, mainly tingly ones through soft skin but the odd nice big jump

i tend to stay clear of open 415V 125A supplies though, let the professionals play with proper lectrickery, too scary for me.

Splash Landings hotel at Alton Towers has the UK's second largest portable dance floor, it's plastic and therefore also the UK's second largest static electricity generator. Rigging there is a somewhat painful experience. You can build up enough charge to make a visible arc to a metal earthed device from a good millimetre away...from your finger.

On the domestic side i got a shock off the dishwasher the other day whilst trying to unblock the pressure sensor, luckily it was to my finger not my lips (you blow into a pipe to unblock it)

Shaking hands with the national grid as some people call it.

Best one yet was a big DC shock, couldn't let go but felt "wired" after it !

A colleage of mine got blasted out of a 3KvA switchgear panel though, best leave it at that.

in VW Beetles, the battery is under the back seat, it sits very close to the steel frame that supports it - you know what's coming...
after fiddling with the electrics, I was reconnecting the battery and got a bit overzealous tightening the leads and bridged the gap between the battery and the frame with a spanner. BANG! - I ended up on the front seat and the spanner ended up stuck in the dashboard.
to top it all I went to retrieve the spanner and burnt my hand on it 😐

Same industry as MMW. Same kind of history.

Had a few doing install work when some c*nt has turned on an isolated and clearly labelled circuit back on while I've been working on it. Funny old world, they got more of a shock from my size 10 steel toe boot up their arse than I did from the belt of the mains.

I have done (note past tense) the odd live 415V tail in. That was in younger and more stupid days. Asked my girlfriend to stand there with a wooden plank to hit me with if I went live...

One gig I did - we were patching a knackered old dimmer rack in a greenfield stage - the only power on site was through the rack, and the only way we could find which lamp was which was by plugging it in via the knackered old patch leads. Between me and my mate we got about 50 shocks in the space of half an hour. Fortunately they were 110V lamps, so merely tingled, rather than chucked you across the room.

I am now older and wiser and wish to be "[b]A[/b]live" rather than just "live"....

22 years in the supply industry teaches you to respect electricity for sure, only ever had 1 shock in all that time, all down to a pin prick hole in a rubber glove, put me on my back though, Spent several years working "Hot Glove" (11kv hands on) in an insulated Cherry Picker, very strange thing to get your head round at first, but after time you really do get a sense of how much power is in the network, seen some massive arc"s when breaking connections, will work live on a network any day of the week, but wont touch domestic stuff...........

Riding near Portpatrick on a beautiful sunny evening. The low sun was sparkling off the sea and it was so beautiful that people were just stopping to look. Overlooking a bay a small crowd had gathered i in silence to drink in the view. We freewheeled up to join them, a bunch of strangers all enjoying a silent appreciation of the world around them. Dismounting from the bikes, leaning them up against what proved to be an electric fence I ruined the moment a little by involuntarily yelling 'F********cking Hell!"loud enough for it to echo.

Yup, I've had a few.

While doing my apprenticeship in control & electrical engineering, we were sorting out a faulty kiln top hat timer, the old control gear had a baker-lite insulation cover on the 24 pin connector, two of the 24 pins were +ve 230v AC, sparky mentoring me said be careful of these pins, they sometimes stick out from "ahhh $hite that hurt" the insulation. So after I stopped laughing I had a go and did exactly the same thing 😳

Had a few lower voltage ones as well, and two at home when fitting new lights as it turned out the black wire was the live - shame the other black was the neggy and the red the ****in earth!!

Worst one I've seen is a 20yrs plus experience industrial spark get a 415vAC belt off a back feed along a negative in a transformer feed, he spent 2 weeks in hospital after that!!