Benm
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- Aug 16, 2007
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I had a Leyden jar capacitor which according to the internets should have had less than a 2pf capacitance. I was bitten by it when it had been charged to about 2KV. Unfortunately this was the first and last time I touched both ends with both hands......... it was like being hit in the chest with a baseball bat.
I suppose you underestimated the capacity (or voltage) then.. 2pf @ 2kV is not that much energy.
To give some concept of magnitude: paddles used for cardiac restart work with something in the order of 200 joules or more. At 2kv you would be looking in the order of 50 uF for that.
Really dangrous starts at about 10 joules of stored energy, which is not beyond the reach of camera flashes at all. Most compacts don't have that much power, but a proper shoe-mounted external flash unit could easily hold enough energy to pose a serious danger if you were stupid enough to touch both ends of it with different hands.