| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 12:16:16 AM | Recently, I received in an email with a diagram of an electric fence “3 phase”. With it, a disturbing picture of what WAS a man’s penis (now resembling a chip of charcoal). The note attached referred to not “pissing” on the fence and a warning as to the outcome.
This got me thinking (not about BBQ charcoal). Could this have been possible?...
Please correct me at any point, but my own electric fence is a pulse, not a steady stream of electrical current. My next thought was the stream of urine. From what I can remember of science, water streams are made up of droplets. My question is, my much wiser POF forum buffs…Is this possible to fry your penis if you urinated on an electric fence? | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 12:18:28 AM | | no. There are no electric fences currently in use with that kind of voltage | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 12:25:32 AM | I remember in Mythbusters, they couldn't even pass a sufficient electrical current using a water gun. Not a squirt gun, but one of those pump action water stream guns.
And they did something about urinating on the 3rd rail, the one that carries electrical current. Still not enough to do anything serious.
I saw the picture on snopes.com and it is disturbing, but I think the claim is a hoax. Even if that is a penis, I can't see any way it can get burnt up that bad from peeing on an electrical fence. | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 12:26:30 AM | | Ok...so it's just about voltage, not about the fact that electric fences pulse, or that the "stream" is made up of droplets. So are you saying given a larger voltage you could do as this picture indicated (just for the record I am not contemplating some sort of boobie trap for men. I like them, and their "gear") | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 12:27:51 AM | | hmmmm, your motives are mysterious........but it is no longer legal to sell powerful electric fences...the current fences will give a shock, but wont leave much of a mark | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 12:43:33 AM |
I saw the picture on snopes.com and it is disturbing, but I think the claim is a hoax. Even if that is a penis, I can't see any way it can get burnt up that bad from peeing on an electrical fence.
Wish I had seen that myth busters episode…
But the picture was compelling (and gruesome, like a train wreck, horrible and yet fascinating)....and did get my brain thinking (thank god that charcoal chip was not attached to any loved one) but more about the stream and electric current. As I am the proud owner of an electric fence, did not relish the idea of one morning waking up to find anyone’s "special bits" no more than a memory... | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 12:47:43 AM | On the internet, there is no short supply of people getting excited over how to use a disturbing picture they've stumbled across, in order to cause fear and worry over something completely unrelated.
It is just a sad fact. You knew well enough to have doubts about it. I wish everyone did that. | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 3:00:48 AM | It's always possible to electrocute someone given enough amperage.
I wouldn't suggest trying the same experiment with a residential power line. | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 3:11:39 AM |
Is this possible to fry your penis if you urinated on an electric fence?
mmm... wait a minute, let me check (ClockworkToy goes outside....)
Ouch! But no, apparently not...
If you grab hold of one though, or inadvertently touch one that's concealed by undergrowth, it feels pretty strange. The pulsing is quite an odd sensation. They're usually around 90volts in this part of the world and are sometimes run off 12v car batteries (stepped up) in remote locations. I've got no idea what sort of amperage is running through them though.
I did see something funny once relating to electric fences. This guy had made a big impressive kite and was using electric fence cord as the tether string, it was the flat braided tape variety with a metallic thread woven into it. It's really strong and flexible, which is why it seemed like a good idea I guess, plus it comes on spools in practically infinite lengths so he probably figured he'd get his kite into space or something.
So anyway he got it launched, with a bit of help (New Years Day - in the main street of a country town...) and it did that violent zigzag side to side thing that kites do and tangled itself in the overhead electric wires that carry mains power to all the houses. It's 240v into the houses, but around 600volts I think up on the poles.
It wouldn't have mattered that much I suppose except electric fence cord is designed to conduct electricity...
There was an audible crack and a fairly impressive spark as the cord shorted the wires, which (luckily for him) melted the electric fence tape. He got a jolt and a bit of a fright, as you do, but he didn't turn into a cinder or anything.
I imagine it would take quite a high voltage combined with some decent amps and a good solid contact to incinerate a person, or even a part of one.
It seems electric fence wire isn't heavy enough to carry that sort of load? | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 3:47:59 AM | All boils down to volts and amps.
a small wire can carry 10,000 volts at bugger all amps or 12 volts with enough amps to melt, say, a wedding ring that someone might be wearing at the time if it shorts out the battery of a car....
Don't know about what volts/amps are needed to fry flesh, but the moment you underestimate, you'll die. | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 8:47:39 AM | It is illegal in this country to run an elecctrifyed fence with that much amperage in it.
Urine will carry an electrical charge. So a stream of urine will carry a charge to the person it is attached to IF they are stupid enough to pee on an exposed current...such as the third rail or whatever.
You can grab hole of an electrical fence, and not feel much of anything...keep hanging on, the charge builds...and then you feel it! The idea is to keep cattle from leaning on it. They can brush up against it, not get anything, but they try to butt it, or lean on it, they get a shock! They learn to leave it alone.
A picture of a burnt sausage on the internet is nothing new. I've seen the guys in grocery stores run hang a sausage out of their flies and walk into the lunch room where the cashiers were eating...the screams, then laughter was worth losing one sausage for! | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 9:52:29 AM |
If you grab hold of one though, or inadvertently touch one that's concealed by undergrowth, it feels pretty strange. The pulsing is quite an odd sensation.
Oh my! I guess the same thing happens if you touch an electric fence... | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 12:09:50 PM | Lots of myths floating around here confusing the difference between Voltage ( The potential difference "FORCE" in a given electrical system) and Current. (the amount of electron "FLOW" through said system)
In the USA house voltages are only 120 volts in any one part of a house it's when two phases of 120 volts that are nearly 180 degrees out of phase are brought in to the same circuit that gives a MEASURED 240 volt difference.
They're usually around 90volts in this part of the world and are sometimes run off 12v car batteries (stepped up) in remote locations. I've got no idea what sort of amperage is running through them though.
No .. the LOWEST voltage range commonly available is around 2000 volts regardless of what the supply voltage is (12 v DC car battery) or 120v AC line voltage.
The highest voltage allowed for a fence by international standards is 10,000 volts and is capable of delivering quite a painful shock when urinated on ... ask my brother... The difference between the famous "Third rail" experiment was at a distance of about 3 feet (the distance between the ground and the source of urine) an electric fence potentially could literally be inches away. Not nearly enough space for the stream to break up into droplets.
As far as fence currents are concerned I can assure you that it is in the very low milliamp range. 10 milliamps across the heart is enough to cause cardiac arrhythmia .. 100 milliamps is considered lethal REGARDLESS of voltage applied.
So anyway he got it launched, with a bit of help (New Years Day - in the main street of a country town...) and it did that violent zigzag side to side thing that kites do and tangled itself in the overhead electric wires that carry mains power to all the houses.
Really!!! .. I doubt it.. seriously .. Those rather unassuming "Lines" going into all your houses are 7200 volts going into the transformers on the poles. with enough current to instantaneously kill anyone and quite effectively burn you from the inside out.
I find it rather odd that international standards for a fence containing animals is only 10,000 volts where as tasers and stun guns intended for Humans can range from 50,ooo volts clear up to 1,000,000 volts.
References:
Electric fence voltages ... http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2001/NicoleCastellano.shtml
Taser and stun gun Voltages ...
http://www.selfdefenseweapons.com/mini-stun-gun.htm
Power grid voltages...
http://science.howstuffworks.com/power6.htm | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 12:52:35 PM | Sorry OP .. never answered your question ..
No .... there is not nearly enough available Joules or Watts to cause the type of damage you described to the human body.
( A measure of total power available is P=IxE ) P = power or watts, I=current, E=Voltage
An average hair dryer may range around 1200 watts ... 120v times 10 amps (roughly speaking)
A kite in the power lines however ... 7200 volts times 100 amps is equal to around 720,000 watts or about 600 hairdryers running at the same time. Now think about 600 hair dryers in the tub with you at once... | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 1:29:24 PM | Standard electrical fences and cattle fences simply do not carry the charge required. It is posible to get an electric shock from pissing on a fence, and I have sen people do it, but its perfectly harmless.
Mybusters is great fun to watch, unfortuantelly they get a hell of a lot of things wrong. For instance, urine in a full blader dose not come out under its own presure but is pushed out by the presure in the blader. Aditionaly, the urethra is not a perfect circle, but almost a figure eight shape. This, combined with a twist provide by the bend of the urethra provides twin streams with a twist that keeps the stream constant.
But yeh, electric fences are harmless. | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 2:15:27 PM | I used to cook hot dogs by putting wires into them and hooking them to wall current (US). They take about a minute to get warm.
I think I can reasonably declare that the spam mentioned by the OP is a fake or an urban legend.
There are stories about people in the Air Force electrocuting themselves by plunging probes from a Simpson VOM on ohmmeter mode into each thumb. This is also an urban legend.
Current is what causes fibrilation of the heart, if there is a significant current path through the heart. I don't know the exact number, but it's around 100 milliamps. However, the body does have a resistance, and there needs to be sufficient voltage to push that current through the body, according to the famous Ohm's Law E=IR, where E is the voltage, I is the current, and R is the resistance. 120 volts can push that much current through, but it's iffy. 240 will do it a lot better.
To cause damage, however, there needs to be enough power to heat the tissue. The power value is the voltage times the current. Electric fences just don't have the power.
Oh, and while voltage is sometimes called EMF for Electro Motive Force, it's more analogous to a pressure than a force. My high school physics teacher refused to tell people what EMF stood for in order to avoid the confusion. | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 2:49:25 PM | I agree 99% with you about everything you said .. right up to the point where you said that house hold voltage was iffy about haveing sufficient pressure / force for an electrocution...
a summary from: http://www.cpsc.gov/library/electro.pdf
From 1990 to 2000 there were 5860 deaths reported by electrocution, 2290 of those from household appliances a rate of 39%
I also read with a little amusement a blog I found during my search for statistics of a person who survived being electrocuted, as the word literally means electric execution. He may very well have been clinically dead but if he was revived he kind of losses his "Electrocuted" status by default. A shocking thought to be sure | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 3:55:10 PM | It's not an electric fence, but this VERY GRAPHIC video does show what a "third rail," either overhead or at ground level, can do to a human being.
Warning: Graphic. Do not view if you have a weak stomach.
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=fc0_1243424473 | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 6:31:42 PM | OK OK I concede the point about the higher voltages. That was unrelated to the point I was making though - that you can't be fried by an electric fence.
I don't concede the rest however.
In the USA house voltages are only 120 volts in any one part of a house it's when two phases of 120 volts that are nearly 180 degrees out of phase are brought in to the same circuit that gives a MEASURED 240 volt difference. I'm not in the USA. Household voltages here are 240 volts and will fry appliances made for the American market.
Electricity is capricious, it's true that people have died from 120v/10A shocks, likewise here from 240v/15A.
Yet people survive lightning strikes, sometimes fairly unscathed. People have survived contact with high-tension 50,000v lines, linesmen for instance, usually because they are poorly earthed.
I've had 240v shocks, also shocks from electric fences numerous times, and shocks off vehicle spark plugs too (which I gather are quite high voltage wise, but low amperage) and, obviously, I'm still alive. Presumably because I wasn't pinned in contact when any of these happened and/or didn't provide a good enough earth.
Which is why the guy with the kite probably escaped death. A combination of the lightweight filament being unable to carry sufficient current to fry him, melting instead, and that he was possibly a poor earth.
If he'd been standing in a bucket of water using an aluminium ladder or perhaps a sailboat mast to fly his kite I guess he would have been in trouble when it tangled in the lines? | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 6:44:40 PM | I stand humbled and corrected ... yes you are right as I was assuming several things 1: that you were referring to voltage inside the continental USA. and 2: that a proper ground/conductor was supplied. There are an infinitely wide array of scenarios that could account for what you presented and I was wrong in assuming the worst case applied for all of them.
I couldn't in good conscious present a case of my own and not respect evidence to the contrary even if it is somewhat humbling.
So I'll slip back into the wonderful obscurity that is the internet and say to you ..
Good Form Man .. Good Form. Touché | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 8:23:39 PM |
Good Form Man .. Good Form. Touché Awww shucks... your graciousness is educational. As is your technical knowledge.
So best leave the slipping into obscurity thing to creationists and other proponents of voodoo mumbojumbo. They do it too well for rational folk, such as yourself, to compete. | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 8:31:06 PM | | when we were kids and had to climb over one ...we would test the electric fence to see if it was on by getting a long blade of grass and laying it on the fence wire. You could feel the pulsing tingle if it was energized. Much less painful than grabbing it with bare hands. We were never stupid enough to pee on one | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 8:40:42 PM | | First of all the voltage doesnt mater volts wont kill you amps will. And no Electric fencs dont carry enoph amps to burn but man you piss on it and I quarantee youll jump and be a little more careful the next time. No I'm not talking through experiance but I could only imagine it wouldn't be plesant. You even have to be careful of the wire being submersed in water cause. | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 9:16:19 PM | OK- nobody brave enough to admit it. I did it when I was probably about 8 or 9, years old. My older brothers of course had me try it while we were out blackberry picking. Didn't feel a thing at first, but it did give a shock, probably similar to what happens when I rewire an outlet in my house and touch live wires! LOL.
Now as for the little guy, I think it was a traumatic experience. His growth was stunted ever since!! LMAO!! | |
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| Pissing on electric fences
Posted: 8/19/2009 9:18:47 PM | The title caught my eye because I once watched a tom-cat pee on a rather powerful electric fence designed for long runs in the Australian outback. Poor guy took off about 8 feet into the air with a blood-curdling yowl each time he hit the ground and bounced back up again. Made MY bladder ache just to see it.
Presumably, the implication in the OP description was to scare off would-be trespassers by suggesting that the fence was ILLEGALLY hooked up to the 3-phase power. Imagine a kid leaning on the fence - or one of those dumber animals that can't read. Anyone who put up a fence like that would be buried in a heartbeat. It is quite illegal. (although Wikipedia describes the use of lethal fences in anti personnel applications).
Depending on the location, 3-phase could be 200 volts on the American continent and Japan, or 400 volts in Europe, Australia and Russian Federation nations. Some places even use 800 volts - I think oilfield pumps do. 200 volts hurts like hell if you accidentally touch it and pull away, but wll cause damage (and eventually kill) if you can't disconnect. 400 volts burns skin within a fraction of a second (cooks your wieners faster).
People have a slightly higher resistance than seawater. It reads quite a bit higher if you measure it across dry skin, but when I wet my hands, a standard meter reads about 20 kilohms. That is over 10 mA for the 200V of the US 3-phase domestic power. The resistance goes down as the cross section of the conductor goes up, but even 10 mA can kill if it gets to the right places for long enough. Time is a major factor. Electric fence pulses last for something between 1 millisecond and one hundredth of that - about 10 microseconds, so the shocks, though of high intensity are too brief to do any harm, even with 10,000 V. Interestingly, Tasers are between 5 and 30 time higher voltage.
A typical overhead power line for a train will be in excess of 1,000V and the third rail usually in excess of 500V. There seems general agreement among many websites that India, the location of the cited video, uses 25,000VAC overhead power on their rail system. Another video shows a similar demise of 3 people in Iran. Couldn't find an indication of what the voltage was there, but the size of the insulators indicates higher voltages than domestic. Typically power distribution lines are 1,000 and 50,000V.
While there is some truth in the notion that volts don't kill you, forgoing posts illustrate that it isn't quite so simple. The nmber of amps efficiently carried by a wire is related to the cross sectional area of the wire. Usually, high voltage lines are designed to carry high currents - like enough to power a train! And provided with a source powerful enough to provide all those amps. So they have plenty amps to fry a person. The cute thing is that resistance determines how many amps any voltage will push through you, so if you're messing with trains, wear rubber boots and gloves - BIG rubber boots and gloves. Those high resistances will limit the current - until the voltage is so high that it would just burn through the rubber. | |
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