Electric Chair Prop

[toddmoon]

I am using a electric chair prop this year for Halloween. I have been wanting to use some real shock built into the chair. I have a muscle stimulation unit that uses a 9 VDC battery to work your muscle's. I want to hook it up to the arm chair edges and have people volunteer to hold on for as long as possible. The unit is programmable and so you can set it to a progressively increasing shock.

The wife has vetoed this however, so I am still trying to come up with something for a shock value. Has anyone done this before?

One alternative I may go with is running warm water through one pipe handle and cold through the other. The human body interprets this as shock and it is only natural to let go. I may be able to get the same effect without the use of any electricity even if it is only from a 9 VDC battery.

[jimswinder]

sounds like a lawsuit just waiting for Murphys Law to happen...

Your wife has "Women's' Intuition" for a reason...

[Alan C]

toddmoon wrote:

I am using a electric chair prop this year for Halloween. I have been wanting to use some real shock built into the chair. I have a muscle stimulation unit that uses a 9 VDC battery to work your muscle's.

The unit has a 9v battery, but it will not use just 9v to stimulate muscles. The unit will make the required higher voltage using the 9v battery to create the required current flow for muscle stimulus.

You need to be aware that a hand-to-hand shock is one of the worst possible scenarios, as the path of the electricity is across the heart, possibly resulting in paralysis of the heart muscle. Your halloween display may end up a bit more realistic than you want. Your wife and jimswinder are correct - do not even consider it!

Regards,

Alan.

[Guest guest]

The others are correct. You will be setting yourself up for some bigtime issues with a lawsuit if someone may have a heart problem and not be aware of it or even if they are and took a chance could be lethal.

This could severly injure a person in many different ways. I have worked with electricity (DC and AC) and the electronics field and even though you might think it's only a 9vdc battery, it's not all that harmless when combined with other things, especially if using a step up transformer or some means to increase the voltage, as this could also increase the amperage, it actually takes less than 1/10 of an amp to kill a person, especially if they may have a heart condition or some type of health issue.

I built a "goofy light" project many years ago as a kid, worked off a 1.5volt DC battery, but that 1.5vdc using a step up transformer put that voltage up to 130vAC to power the random blinking neon lights. I figured, can't be that dangerous, even though the instructions said don't touch any exposed wires going to the bulbs. Well I did, and it knocked me flat on my a$$! And it felt like an eternity before I could get up and move again. It was one helluva shock and I never forgot it. Taught me to respect electricity in both DC and AC form. Lesson learned the hard way.

So the moral is, just don't ever build an electrical type prop and place a living person or animal in it, you might actually kill someone doing so.

Just DO NOT DO IT! I've been into electricity and electronics for over 40+ years, so please heed our advice on this and don't even consider doing something like this.

[toddmoon]

Thanks for all of the input. If the wife says no it means no, no matter how much whining I do.

Having a hot and cold handle will basically give the same effect any way without any of the issues of electrical shock, which is what I am now building into the chair anyway. :cool:

I may just go for the following effect and not let anyone in the chair but myself and save myself the headache of taking the chance someone may break it.

[Jack Mair]

Hi Todd
Mount this under the seat
http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=299-028 an pump some bass into, i'm sure
you will have ur victims jumping