Who here has touched the nasty...

I got nailed badly by an invisible hairline crack in a 720 flyback while reaching around to adjust the pots. I thought my case was a really rare one -- I'm surprised to see that it seems to be the leading cause of all the electrocutions in this thread. Maybe we should get the word out to people to be careful when adjusting those pots and to keep an eye out for cracks. I know that before my incident I just figured "they're knobs, they're safe to grab." Now I'll only adjust them with a screwdriver while a monitor is on.
 
I was reaching for the coindoor switches through the back of a Defender once, and touched my right ear to the neckboard. It hurt bad but there is no real damage, near as I can tell.

Hey, that reminds of this time that I was reaching for the coindoor switches through the back of a Defender once, and touched my right ear to the neckboard. Let me tell you that you do not want to order pizza from that place again, or else you might lose a lot of money out of your 401K due to the cold front now moving though Iowa.

/True story.
 
RetroHacker said:
Actually, the most painful electric shock I can think of was that time I was tinkering with the phone line when was like 12 years old. I was using uninsulated metal pliers to tightly twist two hard to reach wires together inside the wall when the phone rang. That phone ring current is like 20Hz and it REALLY hurts - it twitches your muscles something awful. 120v wall current doesn't even hurt that much.
Click to expand...

No shocks from any tubes but I have also been shocked by the ringing of a telephone while I was adding an extension. That was quite unexpected.

I have also been zapped by the lawn mower shut off lever (hated that type of kill switch), an arc welder - that was weird.
 
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Never been zapped by HV on a monitor, but I've had my share of zaps...

1) Was in high school (10th grade) at the time, working on a small TV when I grabbed the chassis to move it. OOPS. It was off, but still plugged in. My ring and pinky fingers went across the 110v and it felt like they were buzzing badly. Luckily I had my other hand on the opposite side of the TV on the plastic so I could yank my hand off and set the thing down. Ended up with a couple of gashes from the component leads being dragged across the fingers.

2) Mowed lawns for a campground while a senior in high school. One old lawn mower had a plastic piece connected to the spark plug wire that you pulled on to remove the wire from the plug and stop the mower. Well... that old wire had badly crackled insulation and I got NAILED 3 times by spark plug pulses before I could yank my hand back. The worst part was whacking my elbow on the mower handle.

I never used that mower again.

3) Back in the mid 90s I was working on an Apple II power supply. There are 2 types and the one I was working on was the cheap one without bleeder resistors across the main filter caps on the HV side. It fell off the bench and I reached down to pick it up. They were charged and my hand clamped on that power supply. I couldn't drop it so I just flung my arm up and the power supply board flew out of my hand, hit the ceiling and dropped to the bench.

It took 10 years for those scars to fade. Now I double check all high voltage side caps when working on switchers.
 
I've yet to take a HV shot (knock on wood), but I have gotten the tingly from the neckboard once or twice... I also got a nice zap from a pinball flipper circuit...

I've also taken a number of jolts from a Honda 4-cyl coil wire... that sucked the worst frankly...
 
Oh, yeah. I forgot about a recent instance. I was down helping a buddy figure out a display power issue on a pinball. Those who work on pinballs know you can shut it off but the power LED will stay on for a little while as the big filter caps bleed off. Well, I wasn't paying attention and pulled the board before the voltge bled off.

I started walking towards my buddy while looking at the board and my finger came down right across the leads for the filter cap. BZZZZT! I jerked and the board went flying. My buddy got a good laugh after he found out what the hell happened. Luckily, the board was undamaged from it flight and sunsequent landing on the garage floor...
 
avidgeek said:
Not sure if it counts but I pushed on the backside of a neck board while a game was running in fruitless attempts to fix the picture.... Finger met up with some solder side pieces and they quickly went into my skin....the shock was unforgettable, the smell of burning flesh and the pin holes in my finger tips is something that I'd like to forget but thank you for reminding me about it.

No touchy neck board solder side when monitor is ON.

P6120044.jpg
Click to expand...

I did this while working on a Galaga mini. Unfortunately, I was trying to push the neck board in a bit more snugly, my thumb slipped, and the metal points punctured the skin. I flew back 5 feet and shook for a half-hour afterwards.

Still, it's better than sitting up quickly and breaking the neckboard on a Frogger with your skull.. done that one, too..
 
never been hit by a live flyback , but toppled working on a MS pac cocktail and braced myself firmly on the live HOT, theres a reason they are called a HOT. scred the shit out of the old lady , she thought I was dead. also shorted a go7 filter cap into my berries
 
Im a terrible son but cant help but laughing out of shear irony and terror. I just picked up an Altered Beast game, and was doing the whole reach around trick adjusting colors while trying to view the game from the front. Frustrated, and with a burning tired arm, I called my mother to help me out. I told her the knobs to turn and touch nothing else while I looked at the colors. Well while watching the game, all of a sudden the screen flashed black and my mom went AHHHHHHHH!!!!! She had a charred finger and said things mom never said before. She had a numb finger for a few hrs. I still dont know what she touched.
 
Revenge From Mars Pinball. HV not coming up (or so I thought). It was going into shutdown immediately after charging the tube. I didn't discharge the tube the normal way. I did it with my hand when I went to reinstall the chassis later. I got knocked back a few feet and saw a bright blue flash before my eyes. Have also been zapped by the filter cap on a G07 a few times.
 
Havent touched the flyback yet (knocks on wood).. But i touched the isolation transformer while my cocktail was running. I just i touched the 115V on it cause it only felt, to me, like a little current nothing much.. but scared the piss out of me...
 
Just a little tip for folks. Before you go zapping your ass, go to Walmart and for about $10-$15 you can make one of these:

mirror1-1.jpg


Buy a clip-on light... they're like $8 or something. Remove the lamp from the end... it's threaded. Then buy a mirror from Wally World... the one with the small hole in the handle (they still carry it...I just bought a bigger one). Amazingly enough the threaded end of the clip on lamp is PERFECT size to thread on to the softish plastic handle of the mirror. It's secure and works kickass. No more having to deal with reaching around the back of a cabinet. It's one of the most useful tools you will ever make.
 
But then you're living without danger... and where's the fun in that?
 
At CEC, we have these two basketball games by Bromley. The metal hoops are always heavily statically charged by either the ball sensors or the huge amount of static built up in them from the balls. Most of the time its a situation where both of those elements are combined. Before doing preventive maintenance on these, I usually turn them off for a few minutes to let them discharge themselves. Well this day I was running a little late and did the PMs while it was still powered. I climbed inside and began readjusting the sensors. I had rubber soled shoes so I didnt feel a shock until my elbow hit the cage and *SNAP!* *Ahh!!* The shock sent me sideways and I grabbed onto the sensor assembly and the cage at the same time and got some funky current sent through me.
 
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