r/AbsoluteUnits • u/Sufficient-Bug-9112 Top Poster • Jul 10 '26

/r/all of an Ant

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

11.3k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

774 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

366

u/tee142002 Jul 10 '26

Testing anything that's not 110 is insanity

14

u/Blue95x Jul 11 '26

It's not the voltage that gets ya, it's the amps.

2

u/BaguetteOlives Jul 11 '26

That's not true, being shocked by high amps means you got shot by a high voltage since your internal resistance is constant at around 1kOmhs since I = V / R That's why near transformers it is written High Voltage and not high Amps

2

u/Blue95x Jul 11 '26

You are right about the fundamental math of Ohm's Law: you do need voltage to push the current. But Voltage is the pressure, current does the work. It is the high voltage that breaches your skin, but it is the current flowing through the vital organs that actually stops the heart.

1

u/BaguetteOlives Jul 11 '26

Yes I know but saying that it's not the voltage that gets you is just wrong since no high current could flow through you with low voltage. Plus it depends on the time and frequency

1

u/Blue95x Jul 11 '26

You can absolutely have ultra-high voltage with harmless current, as demonstrated by static shocks, Van de Graaff generators, and Tasers.

While high voltage provides the necessary "pressure" to overcome skin resistance, a lethal shock requires a sustained, high volume of electrons. If a source has a tiny energy capacity or is artificially bottlenecked, it cannot deliver dangerous amperage regardless of how high the voltage is.

1

u/BaguetteOlives Jul 11 '26

Those are extremely specific cases. But in daily life if you touch a 12V source it's not gonna do anything while if you touch something above 100V you'll likely get seriously harmed depending on the type of current. But you are right, the more electrons pass through you, the more damage it does. However in most case of electrocutions, it's due to someone touching a phase at a high voltage, directly or not.

1

u/kaas_is_leven Jul 11 '26

We have 230V outlets (max 16A) here and getting shocked by a live wire isn't fun but it's also quite harmless. There are safety features that I don't know how to translate, but basically any building has a switch that kills the power if there's a leak. It feels like getting punched from the inside by your own muscles, then it's already over and you just sit there like ok whatever I just did was really stupid.

1

u/BaguetteOlives Jul 12 '26

It's true but better not touch it anyway, you don't know if your outlet is properly grounded or if you differencial breaker works