And - if it is still unclear after all these years:
You CAN let go of a live wire - if it is AC.
If it is DC, you cannot. There is a re-currant (he he) threat around re a fellow who decided that the puny 3 x AAA stun wand he bought for his SO couldn’t possibly harm him - until he tried it and held it against his bare skin until the batteries were drained. DC will lock muscles - AC won’t.
In HS, I had a cool Physics teacher with a couple of dead-on-one-side neon sign transformers - we used them for woodburning on the lab table tops - and the occasional 12,000 - 15,000v zap.
A variable (0-100 volt) iput to such a transformer would do something like the OP imagines, but it only require a single contact.
Any voltage going from hand-to-hand is going to pass through (or damned close too) the heart - not something to play with.
There is a story of a US Naval electrician-to-be trying to measure the resistance across his hands - witout the skin as an insulator. Story has him sticking an electrode into each hand (thumb?) with the dial of his little multimeter set to “resistance”. That sent a 9vdc current across his heart, killing him.
Heard this story decades ago - no idea if true, but sound plausible, if he actually made contact with blood on both sides,
THREAD! not THREAT… or,well, that too…
Well, it does - as evidenced by the fact that some modern incarnations of the ‘hang on’ machine do have rapidly vibrating handles.
Anyone who has ever used a tool such as an orbital sander or handheld vibratory engraver will be familiar with the tickly sensation these cause in the hands (although it is usually bearable for the duty times of these tools).
At higher/longer levels of exposure, vibration can cause permanent damage of various kinds, collectively known as ‘Hand-arm Vibration Syndrome’ (including ‘Vibration White Finger’), but that’s not what we’re talking about here really.
How can a 3 x AAA powered device be shocking someone with constant DC?
It’s either going to be using an AC step up transformer (with AC output - I guess the output could be rectified, but why?)
or it will be charging and discharging a capacitor, in which case the output will be DC, but not constant.
There is an old vintage machine called a relaxasizer ( spelling) You can crank it up to the point it feels like it is turning you inside out. It uses probes plugged into wet pads and placed strategicaly around your body. You can only guess where us young boys hooked the probes.
Relax-A-Cizor, they have a used one on amazon for $21.00. They retailed 40 years ago for several hundred dollars
Here’s a video showing an " Advance Machine Co Electricity Shock Machine" 1c Coin operated…
Advance Machine Co is labelled as being at Chicago, USA.
One sold recently for $1000.
Old machines like this were common in British pubs in the 40s-mid 60s. The usual one had a small ninepin setup. You pulled on the handle and the harder you pulled the lower the ninepins fell. Of course the current increased too and I can’t remember anyone laying the pins flat. People used to try linking up, one behind the other, to lessen the shock but I can’t recall whether that helped.
Hated the damn things. Once was enough for me and I barely budged the pins!
Here’s Johnny L.A.'s 2009 thread which also mentions the British pubs.
From the 2009 thread:
Still want one. Still have the ‘schematic’. Still don’t know anyone who can make one for me.
Thread title edited, and thread moved to the Game Room, which didn’t exist when this thread was started in 2001.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
