Question about electric shock

[Pete999]

twice in 27 years, i'm a good boy

Bull Poo lol

 

[telectrix]

but the flip side is hilarious.

 

[gazdkw82]

I remember being electrocuted twice when I was about 8 because I had bunkbeds and I thought I grownup enough to change my own lightbulbs....in the dark!

I remember feeling a buzz on my index finger. I don't remember feeling like it scared me or anything, in fact I remember laughing. Never had a shock since

 

[Lucien Nunes]

We can't even begin to guess what the current was. I disagree with the earlier post that it has anything to do with the circuit load current. It will be 230V divided by the resistance of the path it took through you, which depends mainly on the skin contact which can vary widely as you are aware. I'm not even sure what the path was, one contact was with a bayonet plunger but was the other one just the other plunger or were you holding something earthed? If between the plungers, it seems unlikely that any serious physiological damage would have occurred without obvious local effects near the contact points.

I remember being electrocuted twice

You can be shocked twice but only electrocuted once.

 

[gazdkw82]

Shocked twice on 2 seperate occasions

 

[telectrix]

Shocked twice on 2 seperate occasions

so was I. been married twice.

 

[Midwest]

OP don't worry about the ribbing, you did the right thing in going to A&E to get yourself checked out. I've heard of a few people having complications some time after receiving an electric shock. I'm led to believe the most dangerous of shocks are when the path of the shock is across the chest, arm to arm or arm down threw to a leg (i.e. threw the heart), which didn't appear to happen in your case. Again I'm led to believe, the more lethal shocks are when the person can't let go for some time (a few seconds, instead of parts of a second). The involuntary movement you felt was the electricity contracting your muscles, and you body saying let the **** go!

All electricians will have received a good few belts over the course of their careers (hopefully only enough of a belt, so they can continue with said career), normally through theirs or someone else's incompetence, I'm guilty of that.

As an apprentice, I thought the term 'electric shock' related to the electricity flow through the body, but 'quite literally' (best Paul Whitehouse voice), you're experience of the event comes as a complete shock!

 

[Spoon]

lets start a poll, how many times have you been shocked?

Every time a step out of the shower and look in the mirror....

 

[Taylortwocities]

When I left school, I joined the (then) GPO as a telephone apprentice. You start out doing 6 weeks up poles, 6 weeks down holes, etc.

Anyway. My first day on the job was with a crusty old phone fitter to a row of nearly finished new houses putting in their telephones. We go to the first house, he gets the electric kettle from the green Morris Minor GPO Telehones van. Looks around and says "I wonder if there's any juice". Clicks on a light switch and pops two fingers in the empty light pendant socket in the ceiling. He doesn't blink, and says "good, we can have some tea then".

What a fine example to an innocent 17-year old!

 

[Bobster]

When I left school, I joined the (then) GPO as a telephone apprentice. You start out doing 6 weeks up poles, 6 weeks down holes, etc.

Anyway. My first day on the job was with a crusty old phone fitter to a row of nearly finished new houses putting in their telephones. We go to the first house, he gets the electric kettle from the green Morris Minor GPO Telehones van. Looks around and says "I wonder if there's any juice". Clicks on a light switch and pops two fingers in the empty light pendant socket in the ceiling. He doesn't blink, and says "good, we can have some tea then".

What a fine example to an innocent 17-year old!

Not quite the same, but when I first started in the quarry there was an old chap. Hands like shovels and must have had 1/4" callused skin all over.

Used to wash his hands under the instant boiler we made brews from in our electricians workshop.

Never phased him, however when the green apprentice followed suit, there was a hell of a lot of whelping. Scalded himself pretty well.

 

[HandySparks]

With electric shocks, it's the amperage which causes the biggest problem.
Higher the amperage the more severe the damage.
With a live circuit the amperage will be a combination of how much can flow through your body plus whatever amperage is already on the circuit.
Lighting circuits are generally rated at 6A, but rarely run anywhere near that.
If you allow 100W for each light, it would give you just less than half an amp per light. 60W about a quarter of an amp.
So if you know how many lights on the circuit were on at the time you received the shock, you can calculate the amperage on the circuit.

This is a wind-up.......isn't it?

 

[Darkwood]

Can we stick to answering the OP question, we are slightly getting off track here with some replies.

Feel free to start a new thread/pole regarding members and how many times they have had a shock

 

[westward10]

With electric shocks, it's the amperage which causes the biggest problem.
Higher the amperage the more severe the damage.
With a live circuit the amperage will be a combination of how much can flow through your body plus whatever amperage is already on the circuit.
Lighting circuits are generally rated at 6A, but rarely run anywhere near that.
If you allow 100W for each light, it would give you just less than half an amp per light. 60W about a quarter of an amp.
So if you know how many lights on the circuit were on at the time you received the shock, you can calculate the amperage on the circuit.

Is this serious!

 

[telectrix]

this thread is shocking. time for closure.

 

[westward10]

The amount of current which flows is dependant on body resistance and the applied voltage. This body resistance will be dependent on where across the body it flows, hand to hand can be very hazardous as it is likely to bring the heart into the equation. If you are wet the body resistance will be reduced dramatically and hence more current will flow this is why bathrooms and swimming pools are Special Locations due to increased risk. Simple ohms law and we are all different.

 

[Deleted member 26818]

So if you were to insert yourself into a circuit which already had 20A flowing through it, how much current would flow through you?
Would it be more or less than the 20A?

 

[Silly Sausage]

So if you were to insert yourself into a circuit which already had 20A flowing through it, how much current would flow through you?
Would it be more or less than the 20A?

Less than 20A, depending on your resistance, but how often do you put oneself in series in a circuit?!
Remember, touching an energized whatever, you're in parallel with said whatever.

 

[westward10]

So if you were to insert yourself into a circuit which already had 20A flowing through it, how much current would flow through you?
Would it be more or less than the 20A?

Will depend on body resistance at the time, your resistance will restrict the 20A current. It certainly won't be 20A.

 

[Deleted member 26818]

So what happens to to rest of the 20A?
Does it just fade away?

 

[Richard Burns]

If you were to insert your body into a series circuit that previously was carrying 20A then you would be adding (approximately) 1000 ohms resistance into the circuit, this, compared to the 11 ohms that was there before, would reduce the current to about 0.23A to flow through you.

The way I see it is the problem with electric shocks is that the current will make a path through you and cause damage to the cells of the body. This is the part that causes significant damage internally.
However this is generally only encountered where the current can be high enough to kill and the voltage high enough to jump across inconveniently high resistances in the body.
The electrocution effect is stopping the heart which may not cause a lot of damage to cells but does tend to kill outright.

Most of the shocks that some people receive will be very low current (above 10mA) perception limit but below the 50mA (or so depending on time) killing level.
Time is a key component in both death from electric shock and cell damage.