Ion Generator Help

[Meatball]

Those grill starters ARE very heavy hitting! The thing is.. I'd like to provide a shock without any device in my hand that makes it obvious.. That's the hard part.

The generator has only white and black AC input wires, and one HV output wire.

The AC wires are setup as hot, and return. Yet the generator does the same thing with either polarity. Whenever I use this thing from mains power, It doesn't need ground... except a straight shot to a grounded object makes some nice arcs!

 

[Cyparagon]

May I suggest modifying one of these $8 bug zappers? They take two D batteries, so it can fit in your pocket without the racket part. You could even just remove the voltage multiplier board and use a single cr123a or something. I have a couple, and they charge a capacitor up to about 2000 volts. The arcs are only a few mm, but if it's enough power to kill a bug...