Static Electricity

I was out at the shops yesterday when I touched one of the shelves and got a good zap, I touched it again and received a another jolt, I thought the shelf was live, however it turned out to be me, I must have had a fair bit of static electricity built up in my body, silly question, however I thought I would ask anyhow, could that sort of thing interfere with the pace-maker ?

5 Comments

Static Electricity revisited

by donr - 2014-01-10 03:01:54

Pace: It should not affect the old pacer. Static electricity resides on the outer surface of any conductor, so it was all on your skin.

You touched metal & the charge bled off - very rapidly.

I assume you touched the shelf w/ the tip of a finger - as opposed to your nose or some other appendage.

The electrical charge took the shortest route to the tip of that finger, so some of it crossed your body, but not enough to make a significant enough current to bother the PM as it passed it. Whatever it was drained off of you body very rapidly, causing a very tall spike of current in a very narrow time period.

Now high voltage static charge can fry the thin film transistors in the PM's guts - but the PM case is a conductor (Titanium) so it protects the guts from any charge that may be passing by when you discharged yourself.

Ever see a person who is touching a very high voltage static electricity generator? Their hair stands on end, straight out from the skull. Ditto for body hair - stands straight out. If you did not feel like that before the grounding incident, you did not have much of a charge.

Note that the only place you felt it discharge was at the point where your finger touched the metal shelf.

That's where the resistance was high, so energy was dissipated in that spot - you felt it.

Not to worry.

Don

static electricity

by manaman - 2014-01-10 06:01:36

Don explained to a fault. The quick jolt won't do any harm it certainly hurts and will get your attention.
I haven't had the problem lately but over the years I certainly have. There is something about GM autos )not trucks???). Also my problem was mainly in the WINTER months! I remember that nylon clothing also was an issue. I had it so bad that I would ALWAYS touch my vehicle with the key to get discharge!
It still hurts and gets your attention.
Good luck!
Cecil

Static is

by BillMFl - 2014-01-10 09:01:34

High voltage but very low amperage so it doesn't penetrate the skin. All that voltage can really make a snap tho. A much lower voltage combined with even a small amount of amps can do some real damage and make you dance. Fatal if you are grounded. In my youth working as an auto mechanic, we would play a trick on every new guy by loading a charge into an ignition capacitor and then putting it on the work bench. You only fell for that once! Picking up the capacitor (it was smaller than a C battery) gave the newbie one hell of a jolt. Welcome to the shop we would say after laughing our butts off.

Newer PM's OK

by Theknotguy - 2014-01-10 09:01:40

Was in yesterday to get my PM check. Talked with the tech. The newer PM's don't have any problems with electricity, MRI's, EMF fields, arc welding, and a lot of other things.

As said by the previous people, static electricity isn't a problem either. I used to take the anode off computer monitors. 96,000 volts with little amps. It would give you a jolt but it wouldn't kill you.

Theknotguy

zapping

by pace-man - 2014-01-10 10:01:30

As usual you guys always come up with a wealth of knowledge, I didn't think it would have been a problem, but it is best to ask as all this is all new to me and others.
I haven't been zapped like this for a long time, It certainly got my attention, I have in the past had an arc coming from the tip of the finger to what ever it was that I was touching, (sometimes it was my wife, she hates it)
That is interesting what you are saying about the later model pacemakers , I hope mine falls into that group, it is only a few months old
Rick

You know you're wired when...

You have a 25 year mortgage on your device.

Member Quotes

It may be the first time we've felt a normal heart rhythm in a long time, so of course it seems too fast and too strong.