Electrified Perimeter...

[Red Beret]

I was recently looking at electric fence power units, and thought up the idea of using one or two to electrify ones metal security doors at home, provided they aren't grounded, and also metal window frames etc.

If this worked, it would be a very effective home defence mechanism. Some of these power units even use a remote control!

Obviously you could just put an electric fence up, but this way it will take the intruder(s) by surprise and will be much harder to avoid.
Hmm...something else I just thought up; a water cannon that sprays a stream of electrified water...has it already been done?

Anyhow, let me know what you all think. Or tell me I'm wasting my time etc.:D

[simply RED]

Ha, using "electrified water" is not a new idea.
This is the time to tell a story:

There was a contest among Bulgarian institutes to create an "antiterror weapon" .
The contest won "MEI-Sofia" (by the means of corruption of course). They proposed an electroshock - firing streams of conductive water. Over six months those idiots tried to perfect the device.
Until they realised - it does not work through clothes, water makes small drops which short circuit.......

hehehe

Idiot safety rules...

BTW, be careful if you put the phase of a high voltage device on your door. When somebody tries to open the door, the hand can not open and he/she dies. Muscles hold tight under the action of high voltage.

[Daeman]

I suppose you'd have to have a good grounding for that target to get a sufficient shock, last time I checked, rubber sole shoes were sufficient to protect against quite a few volts (saved my butt several times).

I know...er...knew a guy that died by hot wire (electric fence), seems he bent down to pick it up and had just enough time to stand up and make a wrap around his arm before he went into convulsions. but it got him.

Think you could use perhaps a pulsed system with say 10 second intervals between 2 second pulses, should give enough time for the target to let go. also, remember, amperage kills, not necessarily voltage. Ive taken hits of 18,000 at 30 ma with just a few minutes of confusion but seen a guy almost die from a welder running 50 volts and 75 amps for just a few seconds (he required CPR and EMS)

good luck

[simply RED]

"Ive taken hits of 18,000 at 30 ma with just a few minutes of confusion"
YOU'VE TAKEN HITS FROM THE BONG BEFORE POSTING!
HOW DID YOU MEASURE 30 MILIAMPERS AT 18000 VOLTS?

BAN HIM IMMEDIATELY!!! AND LET IT BE KNOWN IDIOTS POSTING AGAINST OUR LIVES ARE NOT WELCOME !!!

HEY ASSHOLE! 20 MILIAMPERS AT 5 KV IMMEDIATELY IGNITE WOOD !!!
YOU WILL BURN LIKE A FUCKING CANDLE FROM SUCH SHOCK!

18 * 30 = 540 WATTS !!!

DO NOT BELIEVE IN SUCH ASSHOLES IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO COMMIT SUICIDE !

[Chris The Great]

For measuring current at high voltage, I merely hooked up the amnmeter in series with it. The amnmeter floats to the high voltage and is fine. Doing this I discovered that my transformer maxes out at 2.5 amps, and compensating for voltage drop, 7800 volts. It really isn't hard at all.

Also, 30mA at 18,000 volts probably has an inch long arc as well, which will drain off a substantial amount of the power output.
But you'll get a burn from high voltage at any sort of current from the arc jumping to your skin.

But his point is that it won't kill you, which it won't. You'll get burned at the entry/exit points but the rest of your body is very low resistance and so won't heat up at all at this kind of voltage.

[nbk2000]

I know that the latest police TASER, the X-26(27?), puts out 20 watts at 50,000 volts, so I know that's fairly safe.

Their cattle version is 4x stronger, so figure 80 watts, which they say is NOT safe for human use.

540 watts? Seems like it'd be lethal...but...it's not being shot in through prods buried in your skin either. Skin has a lot of resistance.

So, since I'm not an electrical engineer (though I play one on TV :p), I'll let him stay until such time as he definitively proves himself to be stupid.

[simply RED]

Okay, I was a bit nervous...

Anyway: His post is completely incorrect, it is like advertising - "hammering organic peroxides is fairly safe".
"""Ive taken hits of 18,000 at 30 ma with just a few minutes of confusion""" means : I've been chewing capsul detonators with just a few teeth blown away.

If you try 30 mA at 18 000 - you will get deep burning ( not entry - exit). With permanent damage to the nerve cells. Nerve cells... Such power lyses all kind of cells! Hamster starts to burn at 20 mA - 5000 V even if it is pulsed voltage. The hamster burns with quite real fire. One 10 miliseconds pulse at 25 mA - 20kV completely lyses (destroys) all cells of a leaf. 20 mA direct current or even pulsed is 100% deadly if applied in : sunsplit, head, back neck, hearth area.

30 mA at 18 000 Volts requires minimum one kilowatt power supply. You can not immagine how powerul is this! It will melt thin electrodes for less than a second.
This is 540 watts delivered to the target; W = U . I; W = 18 000 * 0,03 = 540W ; t=? . This is the whole power of a food heater concentrated in one electric arc.
If he had measured 30 mA at 18 kV, he would have seen what really is this!!!

Hey, we are not doing these things to kill ourselves!
Immagine if someone measure this "power" and try it on himself because "Ive taken hits of 18,000 at 30 ma with just a few minutes of confusion" .
There will be just a few minutes of confusion before the cause of death is discovered by unfortunate observer. :)

p.s. It is quite possible that our misguided noob charged an electric capacitor (at 18 kV !!!!!!!!!! :P :) :) ) and discharged it through himself. Then the amperage is measured quite different way (it was less that 30 mA but he does not know that)... Or maybe he got shocked from TV cascade... Or most possibly - just smoked weed before posting...

If you have DC electroshock (5-50kV), you could measure the amperage at short cirquit. Just put the ampermeter at the end of the device. Remember, this way you are measuring the amperage at low voltage. The voltage drops when the resstance at the end is low. Measure 15mA this way and you have killing device.
If you have capacitor cascade at the end - the amperage is approximated acc. to the graphic of the discharge. The higher the voltage, the higher the capacity of the C-s, the lower the resistance of the target - you get "higher amperage of the discharge".

Interesting effect here is : when voltage is higher than 5 kV and 20- 30 nano capacitor is charged. Sometimes the discharge ionizes the target and its resistance is ignored. Quite well seen on a green leaf.
Another idiotic - suicidal ideas could be read in powerlabs site!
10 kV 30nano capacitor discharge could be felt form 50 cantimeters even through isolation (the feeling is like you've been shocked with piezo). The cretin there charges hundred times more powerful "devices" and talk about it like it is safe or what !!!

[simply RED]

The problem could be theoretized much more but I guess this is enough...

[Chris The Great]

Touching a capacitor gives very high peak currents... I know because I touched a 3kV cap. Feeling every muscle in your body spasm is not a fun experience, especially feeling your HEART do that. It started beating normally afterwards, like a defibulator, but I am far more careful around capacitors now.

I think the general idea is that HV is quite good at harming and killing people, and to simply avoid touching it!

For measuring the current, I drew an arc as opposed to simply shorting the transformers, to give it a load in which to get some resistance and release energy. I also measured the line voltage going into the transformers under load, and using the turns ratio (ran line voltage into the HV secondary and measured the primary output voltage), I calculated the voltage. But it is a little more than just hook up a V meter and take a measurement, there are quite a few things to take into consideration.
AS I said before, that gave 7800 volts at 2.5 amps... :D
That is one hell of an arc!

For wattage wise, I'd suggest going with what NBK said, around 20W. This will allow it run off batteries. Pulsing the power will give a much greater shock by increasing the amperage, for example you could give short pulses of 150mA which will hurt a HUGE amount, but at 20 pulses a second will only immoblize muscles and not the heart, which is the point. We don't want to kill someone with this, just to make them stop. We have guns for killing, they work much better...

[simply RED]

"AS I said before, that gave 7800 volts at 2.5 amps... "

I am not going to criticize that, only to remind you, the safety switches at home can not stand such power. (about 20 kW)

Exactly charging capacitors is the key to make killing device. Pulsing is not that effective as DC is deadlier than AC.
Electroshock is a nice, silent weapon (not always that silent :) ) . I wish, I will be able to post real schematics after 1,2 weeks...

Discharging capacitors... Charge 30n at 10-20kV. (More than 10kV capacitors are very very hardly available.) The discharge is extremely rapid. Almost always the targeted material is ionized (cells are lysed) and becomes absolutely conductive. Sometimes you fell the pulse from 50cm. One such shock is deadly if applied correctly.

10kV - 0,5 cm ; 20kV - 1cm ; 100kV - 5 cm.

Seems like Daeman really tried 30 mA and is unable to post to defend himself :) .

[Chris The Great]

"AS I said before, that gave 7800 volts at 2.5 amps... "

I am not going to criticize that, only to remind you, the safety switches at home can not stand such power. (about 20 kW)

Indeed, it has permamently destroyed a 240V 30A breaker... which was a shame since they are fairly expensive.

[Jacks Complete]

When you discharge a capacitor, the voltage drops quite quickly, so the arc starts, makes the connection, then the power continues to be pumped into the target. This is fatal for large capacitor banks, which take a few seconds or more to drop much, but only very sore for small capacitors, since they drop very, very quickly.

People have survived direct lightening strikes (one man has survived 7 or something daft!) with no adverse effects. Tiny shocks can kill, while massive shocks can leave the idiot holding a bent screwdriver, wondering what happened.

If you want to stop people walking in, just use a cattle fence supply on the handle. Be aware that shocking peole is a criminal act, and killing old ladies with pace makers may be fun, but is definately illegal.

Edit:
AS I said before, that gave 7800 volts at 2.5 amps...
That is one hell of an arc!For how long? Or is that a typo? A UK wall socket is capped at 13A @ 240V RMS, and that is 3125W. You are claiming 19,500W, over six times that. That's a draw of 81A at 240V, or 162A at 120V.

How did you draw that, and what from?

[Chris The Great]

That is not a typo. My breakers stand up to this abuse for maybe 5 seconds before tripping, drawing a continuous arc, longer if I wait a few seconds between them. Sometimes, they won't "un-trip" for a while and my last one before it was put into storage never has come back. They are NOT meant for that amount of power draw. The lights in the house dimmed while I used it as well...
The current is just from the two 120V lines for the standard Canadian house, with 240V between them. I have a large 50A socket for this especially to use in my lab.

The device is 4 deshunted MOTs (microwave oven transformers) each putting out around 2400 volts, connected in series. There is nothing to limit current except for the resistance of the house wiring and that of the MOTs themselves, and the fact I have removed the shunts removes the only thing the MOTs have built into them to prevent them from pushing out that much current.

Everything in it overheats very quickly. I am working on it again, adding current limiting to keep the current at 600mA, or 6000 watts when not including the inevitable voltage drop from resistance.

It is a very dangerous toy, and it is incredibly scary what it does to organic things. I fried an apple with it, the nearly 3 foot arc crackled madly as it ripped a gouge into the apple as smoke spewed out from everywhere!
This just might be what you're looking for to get rid of those pesky pets/people although it only jumps about half an inch or so (maybe a little more) through the air.

I will get some pics of the rebuild if anyone is interested.

[dennyn226]

Let me say first that this insupordination is not meant as any type of disrespect toward the administrators, or any of the moderators or other members of this forum. I am not an expert on the topic of high voltage, but it is amazing what a shocking experience and a little research can do.

I am not advocating intentional shocking of yourself with high voltage, nor am I saying do not take precautions. It always good to be as cautious as possible, never assume something is off or reach over part of the experiment as I did. Nor is this post an attempt to cause conflict. This post is to correct some information in this thread which I believe is invalid.

"Seems like Daeman really tried 30 mA and is unable to post to defend himself"

I am alive and remain well.

What happened to me was direct through a neon sign transformer rated at 18kv @ 30ma running on 12 VDC with a current draw of around 750 to 1000 watts, no capicitors involved. It was a momentary touch on my right arm near the wrist, it hurt and I was dazed and confused for a few minutes. However, the hit was on my arm and moved down my right side (either way it did not have a path across my chest). The effects of the hit were definately unique to my body type and situation, but after all, if 30 ma can melt thin electrodes, then it should have killed me or atleast caused fibrillation or respiratory arrest.


"If you try 30 mA at 18 000 - you will get deep burning ( not entry - exit). With permanent damage to the nerve cells. Nerve cells... Such power lyses all kind of cells! Hamster starts to burn at 20 mA - 5000 V even if it is pulsed voltage. The hamster burns with quite real fire. One 10 miliseconds pulse at 25 mA - 20kV completely lyses (destroys) all cells of a leaf. 20 mA direct current or even pulsed is 100% deadly if applied in : sunsplit, head, back neck, hearth area.

30 mA at 18 000 Volts requires minimum one kilowatt power supply. You can not immagine how powerul is this! It will melt thin electrodes for less than a second.
This is 540 watts delivered to the target; W = U . I; W = 18 000 * 0,03 = 540W ; t=? . This is the whole power of a food heater concentrated in one electric arc.
If he had measured 30 mA at 18 kV, he would have seen what really is this!!!"


1. Deep burning depends on the amount of amperage that is sent through your skin into your body. As your skin's resistance decreases as the current is applied that may happen after a few seconds, because 3 seconds of 30 ma is the same as 1 second of 90 ma at the same voltage.

2. I have never burned a hampster, but I have burned wood. It is not too spectacular; it does burst into a small shallow burning flame. It burns along the surface and conducts where you have carbonized the wood. I imagine a hampster would have an interesting effect, but nothing like what people want to imagine, a small flame from the entry and exit points would be about it for that amount of current until the hampster carbonizes at that point then the arc moves on.

3. Do you believe 20 ma is lethal 100% when admistered to the head? How do you think Electroconvulsive therapy works? they feed amperage up around 900ma into the head at voltages well within the range considered lethally conductive past the skin. (upward of 30V).

4. You are correct, its draw is a lot of watts, but keep in mind what makes up those watts. Amperage kills tissue, not voltage. 18kv @ 30ma did not do anything to me that I or my doctor can see now (or a day after the accident), but turn that around to 540 watts = 180v * 3amps THAT would devinately cause long term negative effects or death. Turn it again to 540watts = 180,000V * 3ma that would cause a large arc because of the high voltage, but create relatively little heat compaired to 180V and would be even less dangerious to most people than what I received.

My point is watts are somewhat irrelevant in guaging danger as damage to the body depends mostly on current (but voltage is a definite factor).



relevant links to prove my point:

http://www.osha.gov/SLTC/etools/construction/electrical_incidents/eleccurrent.html
http://www.cdc.gov/elcosh/docs/d0500/d000543/section2.html
http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/aug98/899698536.Eg.r.html

http://www.dadco-llc.com/distribution_system.htm
http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2005/GinaCastellano.shtml

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinical_depression#Electroconvulsive_therapy


If this post is allowed through, I imagine banning of this account will follow shortly. If for some reason I am not banned, I would love to have my old account back.

[nbk2000]

Mega must have approved this, but it matters not, for BFL'd is BLD'd.

dennyn226 is ALSO BFL'd, just like his previous incarnation, daeman.

[simply RED]

"Up around 900ma into the head !"

No shit?

"What happened to me was direct through a neon sign transformer rated at 18kv @ 30ma running on 12 VDC with a current draw of around 750 to 1000 watts, no capicitors involved. It was a momentary touch on my right arm near the wrist, it hurt and I was dazed and confused for a few minutes. However, the hit was on my arm and moved down my right side (either way it did not have a path across my chest). The effects of the hit were definately unique to my body type and situation, but after all, if 30 ma can melt thin electrodes, then it should have killed me or atleast caused fibrillation or respiratory arrest. "

You touched only one of the electrodes (the phase), or you touched both the phase and the zero (ground)?
I was unable to understand what you have written...
Consider the idea of going to normal school before posting here!

[sparkchaser]

Unfortunately I will have to agree with dennyn226/daeman (and I am a communications electronics tech) it is current and not voltage that kills. Take into account static electricity. Very high voltage (up to 1,000,000 volts easily carried on the human body) with almost no current. That's why static kills circuit boards so easily when you don't even feel the discharge. I cant remember the actual amperage, but I believe it is in the 50 ma range that current becomes potentially lethal.

[GibbsFreeEnergy]

One of the main factors to consider when gauging the potential lethality posed by electric shock is whether the current is grounded or not and then the number of leads the victim is touching. Obviously, if a closed circuit is made through a human body between two electrodes, the burns will be severe and likely result in death at moderate to high amperage levels. The wearing of rubber shoes can greatly help someone's chances of survival if they are coming into contact with only one hot electrode. 18,000 volts and 30 amps definitely has the capability of being lethal, but as I have previously stated it all depends on the exact mode of shock.

I believe this man could have taken some hits from his bong and helped his muscles relax before the shock hit him and he had a lesser muscle contraction reaction to the electricity and therefore survived :p. I used to work at an electromagnetics company which employed the use of a high voltage lab with high amperage applications as well for the testing of various electromagnetic devices like linear motors or large rotary motors. I know my electricity safety pretty well.