Things some idiot got wrong and now can't be put right

[Drago]

Most of it was 7.62, so the rounds are probably still airborne.

Live ammo, Raleigh Choppers, penknives for our third Birthdays...the seventies were deadly, but awesome.

 

[Garry A]

I've had a couple of mains jolts too. One was at school where someone messed with the plug on an amp and I strummed the bass guitar plugged into it. Felt like a big pair of hands grabbing my shoulders and neck, probably the muscles contracting. Other time I was much younger and did something silly with a socket

 

[slowmotion]

I'm red/green colour blind but I can see both colours perfectly well. I have wired a neutral conductor into a live terminal but that was because I was in a hurry and tired at the end of

The 350A fuse pictured there reminds me of my favourite childhood pastime...putting rounds in my Dad's vice and whacking them with a hammer.

We used to put 0.22 rounds on the railway tracks. We had to cycle away pretty fast before The Transport Police turned up.

Oh sorry! I thought this was the "Boys will be boys" thread....

 

[Yellow Fang]

Easy way to remember how to connect a BS1363 plugtop.

The 2nd letter tells you where the colour goes

bRown right
bLue Left
sTripy Top.

It was decided on those colours by a large committee of clever folk....

So was the Nicene Creed.

 

[TVC]

Interesting thread, I design, but mostly build transformers and reactors for power transmission systems upto 330kV as well as isolated dc systems to 1,000,000V.

You soon gain healthy respect fot a test power supply that regularly breaks down over 32 inches of air with a nice fat lightning bolt and can induce a load of 40 tonnes over 1/50 of a second on the whole transformer structure..

 

[classic33]

When it comes to electrickery

MY favourite was the point where there were to companies in the US, Westinghouse and Edison

One was using DC and one Ac, and arguing about efficiency, safety etc


Then up came the Electric Chair..... the devious and Machiavellian steps each company took NOT to get the contract and have their system seen as lethal is brilliant

Link

Edison and Tesla, or DC versus AC.
Battle of the currents


The Abyssinian electric chair
On August 6, 1890, the first electric chair in history was put into use in the death chamber of Auburn Prison in New York. In distant Abyssinia – now called Ethiopia – Emperor Menelik II (1844-1913) heard about it and decided that this new method of execution should become part of his modernisation plan for his country. Immediately, he put in an order for three electric chairs from the American manufacturer. When the chairs arrived and were unpacked, the emperor was mortified to learn that they wouldn't work – Abyssinia had no electricity. Determined that his investment would not be completely wasted, Emperor Menelik adopted one of the electric chairs for his imperial throne.

David Wallechinsky et al, The Book of Lists (London: Corgi, 1977) p.463

 

[subaqua]

So was the Nicean Creed.

That's debatable !

 

[User33236]

Edison and Tesla, or DC versus AC.
Battle of the currents

Article was doing quite well until near the end:-

"an AC current of 6,000 volts" !!!!!!

 

[subaqua]

Article was doing quite well until near the end:-

"an AC current of 6,000 volts" !!!!!!

my OCD very nearly exploded in rage at that. but the anger management training from years ago helps when dealing with stupid

 

[MossCommuter]

OK...let me put it another way

Long, long ago, the hour was invented. Everyone stood around looking at the hour and thought it was great. But then some wiseguy piped up "Hey, what if I want to boil an egg or something, those hour thingies are useless for that"

So everyone stood around wondering what to do until a bright spark said "I know what we'll do, let's split the hour up into bits". There was much discussion as regards how to split the hour up. Finally a clever maths type dude said "How about 60 bits? That way you can easily get 1/2 an hour, 1/3, 1/4, 1/5, 1/6, 1/10, 1/12, 1/15, 1/20, 1/30 of an hour"

"I like it" said the guy who wanted to boil an egg. And thus, the minute was created as 1/60 of an hour. The End

And so, the software engineer boils his eggs silently cursing

 

[Yellow Saddle]

Article was doing quite well until near the end:-

"an AC current of 6,000 volts" !!!!!!

That one went over my head. Would you please explain.

 

[Drago]

Currently is measured in Litres, not Volts.

 

[Tanis8472]

Currently is measured in Litres, not Volts.

Lol


Ahem amps

 

[the_mikey]

Neutral is very close to earth and can indeed be regarded as being at 0 V. But the phase wire (colloquially and pretty universally called the live wire) goes from 0 up to 325 V, back through 0, down to 325 V the other way, back to 0, and repeat every fiftieth of a second. 230 gets into the act because it's the average of that variation (using one particular averaging method) - it kind of makes sense that the average has to be less than the maximum.

UK mains voltage: 650v peak to peak.
325v peak
230v root mean square.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Root_mean_square

 

[User33236]

That one went over my head. Would you please explain.

You apply a voltage (V) across something to create a current (Amps) through it. The current created by a voltage potential would vary depending on the impedance of the load across which it is applied.

Terms that commonly get used like 'voltage through' and 'current across' or, as in this case, quoting a current as a voltage are therefore wrong.