Cautious Reminder - Ohio Teen Electrocuted Conducting ‘Jacob’s Ladder’ Experiment

[Jecarroll7]

Safety First.

Ohio Teen Electrocuted Conducting Experiment He Saw On YouTube « CBS New York

[mhuss]

"Microwave battery pack" indeed. You Tube must be stopped! Aggh!!

When I was a teen we made a great Jacobs Ladder out of a massive old neon sign HV transformer (and coat hanger wire, natch). I'm sure we were the scourge of radio and TV reception in the neighborhood, but no one ever got hurt. At this point in time, the internet had not yet been invented.

Sadly, you cannot keep dangerous knowledge out of the hands of every person too simple to handle it. That genie is out of the bottle.

[Tom Phillips]

...Sadly, you cannot keep dangerous knowledge out of the hands of every person too simple to handle it...

Yep. "Don't be messen' with stuff strange to you." They should teach that in school. At least before they teach physics. I won't be holding my breath waiting for that to happen. Double sadly, there is a lack of teaching common sense if not a total inability or prohibition on teaching same.

[g1]

What is a "battery pack from a microwave oven" used for?

[The Dude]

What is a "battery pack from a microwave oven" used for?

Electrocution, ...... apparently.

[Jecarroll7]

Guessing its an AC/DC portable? Need a car battery to run one.

As we all know it's not necessarily the voltage that gets you. Back in the day I got zapped dozens of times by 40,000 volt color TV flyback transformers. It smarts, but you do more damage jerking your hand out of the set.

[Justin Thomas]

That, or "battery pack from a microwave" means there's some confusion between a battery and a condenser/capacitor... is the whole V/I thing kinda like the whole moving body physics thing - it's not how fast you're going, it's how fast you stop. In the case of electrocution, is it how fast all that stored voltage is let out? I know it's not a perfect analogy, but would it kinda work here?

Justin

[Enzo]

I used to have a terrific JAcob's Ladder years ago, based on a 15kv neon sign transformer. We also used coat hanger wire until I decided to dress it up. Then I went to the hobby store and got a couple pieces of thick piano wire and formed them into shape.


I also had some of the neon tubes from an old HOTEL sign. The big round O was great. I discovered to my delight, that if I connected the neon O glass across the ladder, instead of the glowing neon AND ladder effect, what happened was the thing started an arc down low and laddered up until it hit the top at which time the neon lit and that was that. Apparently, the staring gap at the bottom through air was the lowest resistance until it got to the top and struck th neon arc. Once the neon plasma formed, the bottom gap was no longer lowest.

The hot flame dancing across looked hot, so I tried holding a piece of paper between the poles. I could in fact ignite the paper. But sometimes the arc just continued up the poles leaving a little line of burnt edge dot sized holes in the paper. A steam punk perforator maybe.

I could be wrong, but apparently the arc starts at the bottom at the smallest gap, and it is convection air currents that make it rise.


Used to also enjoy making relaxation oscillators. Real basic. A cap, a resistor and a neon lamp. A B+ supply. Think I used about 300v from my bench supply. Resistor in series with the cap, cap charges. Neon bulb parallel the cap. When the cap charges up to the bulb striking voltage, the bulb light, which discharges the cap, and the relaxation cycle begins again. I found I could cascade several stages at different freqs and they'd interact and modulate each other.

[The Dude]

Many moons ago, in one of my first bands, we made flash pods on the Jacobs Ladder principal. You never had to buy electric matches. We used furnace step up transformers for the supply. Then, there were a couple of contacts inside of a pipe mounted on a base that would arc across and ignite the powder. You just dump the powder in and throw the switch- BOOM. Then repeat as needed with no electric match to replace.

[Leo_Gnardo]

Used to also enjoy making relaxation oscillators. Real basic. A cap, a resistor and a neon lamp. A B+ supply. Think I used about 300v from my bench supply. Resistor in series with the cap, cap charges. Neon bulb parallel the cap. When the cap charges up to the bulb striking voltage, the bulb light, which discharges the cap, and the relaxation cycle begins again. I found I could cascade several stages at different freqs and they'd interact and modulate each other.

Those are good clean fun! At college one of my apartment mates made a matrix of 100 of them, we called it Ed's Nothing Box. Had a master speed control too. Lots of fun for stoners to watch at parties. Ed went on to be a top astrophysicist at U of Arizona. (That's how they get started.)

[Tom Phillips]

...or "battery pack from a microwave" means there's some confusion between a battery and a condenser/capacitor...

My assessment is that the reporter is just totally clueless. I doubt that there are any practical battery operated microwave ovens. Most require 1kW or more to run them. Mine requires 1.5kW. A photo of the power supply section is attached. The cap is rated at 2200VAC. A microwave power supply operates at a voltage too low to run a Jacobs latter. Unfortunately for the dead experimenter a microwave power supply can produce lethal electrical energy.

More...In my first post I now realize that I was most upset with the dumb reporters and the idiotic comments made by the relatives who were certainly upset because of the death of the kid. The poor kid was just curious and trying to learn something. It's too bad that he didn't have a mentor to guide his quest for knowledge. I can think of lots of things I did that could have killed me or my friends early in my life.

[Enzo]

Oh amen brother.

I had a chemistry set, and knocked over my alcohol lamp one day, spilling the burning fluid onto the rug. Could have burnt the house down.

Later, I discovered how to make black powder, and proceeded to do so, then branched off into other "rocket fuel" concoctions. Used to make that stuff in the basement.

And of course working with tube electronics circuits - because that is all there was - while I was in grade school. tried to make an oscilloscope from a scope CRT a neighbor had given me. Needed 1500v for the third anode. took a 120/12 filament transformer and turned it around, so 120 into the secondary made 1200v come out the primary. It even worked for a little while. I have since learned not to do that.


Reporters usually don't know anything about what they report, they just read a script off a prompter. One local new "anchor" reported on a bunch of nature lovers from our local Autobahn Society. In fact that same one at another time announced the historic occurrence in South Africa of the "first African American" to be appointed to some post in their government. I felt obligated to call her and ask, "Really? African AMERICAN?" She said, "But I didn't want to call him BLACK." I asked why not? because surely he was not an American. (pause....) Oh...

had a reporter come into our store once, asking things, so I asked him a few questions about the issue he was researching. I figured he was on the story, he'd know. Nope, "Gee I have no idea."

[Tom Phillips]

...Reporters usually don't know anything about what they report...

Yep. 100% of the time that I have witnessed something in person and then read a news report about it later, the news report contained errors or down right BS.

[Mick Bailey]

There are battery-powered microwave ovens - usually 24v. Modern truckers use them. How else can you maintain a 28,000 calorie a day diet on the move?

[ric]

There are battery-powered microwave ovens - usually 24v. Modern truckers use them. How else can you maintain a 28,000 calorie a day diet on the move?

I drove long-haul for a while and with all that mac n cheese and fried chicken at every truck stop keeping up an unhealthy lifestyle doesn't require a microwave in the sleeper.

I used my battery power to run an elec cooler so I could shop cheaper n healthier at a grocery store.

(And of course an inverter so I could run an amp for guitar)