Since the UK abolished the "troy pound of gold" you'd probably have to find out if they replaced it with a different pound measure. If not then that "pound of gold" in your pocket is just a fiction and worth as much as the contents of your other pocket- nothing.
Is a shock worse from the neutral
- Thread starter tom baker
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Since the UK abolished the "troy pound of gold" you'd probably have to find out if they replaced it with a different pound measure. If not then that "pound of gold" in your pocket is just a fiction and worth as much as the contents of your other pocket- nothing.
- Location
- San Francisco Bay Area, CA, USA
- Occupation
- Electrical Engineer
Very interesting to read this thread today. I took a required First Aid certification class about a month ago because I do some stuff with Special Olympics, and I have to report that however correctly oriented this debate is among us, it is WAY off base from what it apparently is based on! Remember, these sort of statements come from people who are NOT in the electrical trade.
I heard this nonsense for the first time in that class, yet I had taken this class 4 times before and never heard that before, so it might be some new(ish) urban / internet myth. I challenged the instructor on it not really expecting a reply and assuming it might be based on a misinterpretation or something involving difference in ground potential, i.e. if you were standing in water and grab a neutral wire and there is a higher resistance to ground at the ground rod or pipe connection than you are presenting, maybe. Not knowing that I was an EE, she came back immediately, spoken WITH AUTHORITY, that it was because there is no circuit breaker or fuse on the neutral, so you will not be protected by it because nothing will stop the voltage! (sic). All of the other people in the class nodded their heads with knowing agreement, implying that I was an idiot for not knowing that because it was soooo obvious to anyone with a brain...
I set them straight of course, informing them that short of a GFCI, nothing will trip in any amount of time necessary to prevent serious injury or death regardless of which wire you grab, and that it was foolish to think otherwise. But I'd bet that many of them will not believe it based on the comments I heard later. I mean, after all, I was NOT the Red Cross teacher, I was just a "student" like the rest of them. I wrote a note to the local Red cross chapter to let them know this was being put out there, and they did reply that it is not something that they officially include in their curriculum, so they couldn't address where the instructor had come up with that.
:slaphead:
I heard this nonsense for the first time in that class, yet I had taken this class 4 times before and never heard that before, so it might be some new(ish) urban / internet myth. I challenged the instructor on it not really expecting a reply and assuming it might be based on a misinterpretation or something involving difference in ground potential, i.e. if you were standing in water and grab a neutral wire and there is a higher resistance to ground at the ground rod or pipe connection than you are presenting, maybe. Not knowing that I was an EE, she came back immediately, spoken WITH AUTHORITY, that it was because there is no circuit breaker or fuse on the neutral, so you will not be protected by it because nothing will stop the voltage! (sic). All of the other people in the class nodded their heads with knowing agreement, implying that I was an idiot for not knowing that because it was soooo obvious to anyone with a brain...
I set them straight of course, informing them that short of a GFCI, nothing will trip in any amount of time necessary to prevent serious injury or death regardless of which wire you grab, and that it was foolish to think otherwise. But I'd bet that many of them will not believe it based on the comments I heard later. I mean, after all, I was NOT the Red Cross teacher, I was just a "student" like the rest of them. I wrote a note to the local Red cross chapter to let them know this was being put out there, and they did reply that it is not something that they officially include in their curriculum, so they couldn't address where the instructor had come up with that.
:slaphead:
- Location
- Placerville, CA, USA
- Occupation
- Retired PV System Designer
Not mention that the current on the neutral would have to be originating from a breaker somewhere, either through loads or through a fault.
Now the service neutral could pack a real wallop, but then so could the service ungrounded lines.
ptonsparky
Tom
- Occupation
- EC - retired
One can't make you any more dead than the other, IMO, of course.
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
- Occupation
- EC
When it comes to general first aid and emergency response, all conductors should be considered live unless a qualified person has told you they are safe to approach. IMO that is what the instructor at the safety course should have been teaching, especially a course primarily for non electrical professionals.
- Location
- San Francisco Bay Area, CA, USA
- Occupation
- Electrical Engineer
Absolutely. My concern was that there was this really bad idea floating out there that a regular circuit breaker was somehow going to protect someone. From becoming charcoal, maybe, but the difference will be lost on your surviving relatives.
ggunn
PE (Electrical), NABCEP certified
- Location
- Austin, TX, USA
- Occupation
- Consulting Electrical Engineer - Photovoltaic Systems
As a person who has been shocked by a spark plug wire while standing with his crotchal area in contact with the fender of the car, I heartily concur.
hmy:Although I don't believe the shock would be any more from the neutral than it would be from the hot conductor.
Because you would get the inductive kickback from either side of the ballast.
But it would be a lot harder to be in the situation to get that shock from the hot side.
When I received my shock from the ballast kickback I was working in the ceiling bar joist with my arms resting on the bar joist and taking the neutrals apart.
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
- Occupation
- EC
But you will not experience the kickback voltage unless you find a way to contact the conductor and are holding it when you open the circuit. If you pull it out of a connector then touch it, you have to do all this within milliseconds maybe even microseconds or the kickback is over by the time you touch it.
iceworm
Curmudgeon still using printed IEEE Color Books
- Location
- North of the 65 parallel
- Occupation
- EE (Field - as little design as possible)
Yep, as soon as the arc is gone, any extra voltage is gone - the magnetic field has collapsed. The circuit is just left with the normal 277V.
Unless it is a DC source, I don't even know how one would know that there was any extra 'shock", or if there was extra, how one would know that the extra was due to "inductive kickback" and not just lowered contact resistance.
Just to instrument and know, would take a pretty good piece of equipment.
ice
an injury lawyer?
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