Juice

I heard a nasty story about a Ruislip driver when I was on Work Experience. The driver in question was in area B (outside car sheds) and was wearing sandals and shorts, which is strictly prohibited when at trackside.

His train was stabled in one of the outdoor roads. If he went via the designated path, he would have had to walk a lot further, so he decided to walk across the tracks. He tripped over the pozzie and he landed on the neggie, thus causing a short circuit. I'll leave the rest for you to work out.

Now I know some people are going to laugh at this as it has a funny side but it was decidely dodgy. Late 1966 me and my driver were walking up to our train stabled in Ealing Common depot. It was quite early but daylight. It was also pouring down with rain and we both had our long LT issue raincoats on. You know the ones. Black and stiff and looked like you were walking around in a tent. Anyway I was instructed to make a can and then come to the train while he went ahead. I did that and when I came out he was standing talking to another driver who, in fact, wanted me. So I stopped to find out what for while my mate started to cross over the tracks for quickness. Now he wasn't a very tall man and the Mac came rather far down on him and as he lifted his leg to step over the positive rail the bottom of the mac touched it. These mac's were rubberised as insulation but being so wet a path was established and there was a "crack" and a small flash and he went rigid and like something in a slapstick film his cap flew straight up in the air!!!. The driver I was talking to and me dashed over to him but apart from being a bit shaken he was OK.

Then he said "Where's me 'at" and with that the other driver collapsed into uncontrollable paroxyms of laughter which in turn set me off as I knew what he was guffawing about. My mate at that moment failed to see the mirth and berated us saying "You rotten pair of c*nts, I could have lost me life and all you can do is effingwell laugh" He was quite indignant and can you blame him. However when we settled down we told him what we had seen and them HE fell about laughing.

Quite why his hat flew off like that I'll never know but as his hair was on end too it may have been something to do with it.

As For the feeling of getting a jolt from the juice it's not nice I can tell you. I never got one from the actual rail but I did a couple of times when changing dud 630v fuses on Q stocks. You can feel that severe tingling in your body and your heart races and the terror is it HOLDS you and it takes a real effort to tear your hand away from contact. Electricity is like the sea, a good friend but a terrible enemy. So when dealing with it be VERY, VERY CAREFUL.

when i was doing my pts course, there was a tale told about the woes of wearing flared trousers in the 70's in proximity to electrified 3rd rails....apparently there were a few instances of people being electrocuted while stepping over the rail in the correct manner, but the flares were so big they touched the top of the rail....and all those man made fibres in thos days too....nasty!!

The worst i've had is Twelve volts off a car battery.
I'm told that DC current will 'grab', and AC 'throws away'. On that basis, i'd rather get a belt of AC! ;D

Nah not really. It was more the shock of it happening than the shock itself. ;D

Did I hear correctly, that old Met Loco [sarah siddons etc] motormen's caps had an insulated layer???
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ALL old style LT caps had an isulating layer of plastic inside the top. Green stuff. But a lot of the men used to take it out as it made the head sweat something terrible.

There was nothing i could do but carry on, unfortunately the fox was still upright so continuing involved hitting it with the train!
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Which was probably a mercy as it just MAY have still been alive.

Hmmm... never felt 12 V. The lowest voltage I feel is around 60 V (our phone line voltage).

Traditionally GPO phone lines used to use 48v.

I've been zapped with 240v domestic mains before. Had a numb arm for about an hour afterwards, then lots of tingling sensations.

Err, yeah, getting zapped by 240v isn't something I want to happen again...was me own stupid bloody fault anyway.

Not long ago, some little **** decided it would be a good idea to hurl a metal rod onto the railway line at Hampstead Heath [on the NL Line]. Sparks must have showered upwards of at least 20 feet. I gave chase but lost the little ****. When I got back to the station, staff were already dealing with the incident. I gave details of what I had seen. When they removed the rod, there was a distinctive chunk missing from both the Live Rail and the Running Rail. Looked like the rails had just melted.

since this thread is getting everso technical I will explain.
He touched one rail so got charged up like a capacitor: in other words lots of charge but no current (remember the old Van De Graaf generator?)
now, both he and his hat have a strong positive charge, and as we all know like charges repel. So hat wants to get as far away from body as quick as possible.
You are right about the hair too Q8, all hairs same charge so up they go and separate as far as possible.

Traditional analogue telephony circuits are d.c. line-powered, typically around 50V in UK, but ringing signals have an a.c. component. Ringing signals are of course only occasionally present. The degree of exposure to telecom line and ringing voltages in consumer equipment is determined by standardised test fingers and test probes, in order to limit the area of human contact and current.

In locations where only professionally-trained people work, insulation and access levels to telecom voltages will be determined by the authority responsible for that area, but it would be common for normal (consumer-equivalent) insulation requirements to apply.

The above is a grossly simplified overview on what is a very complicated subject (and way OT here).

Russ
(who was for many years professionally involved in standardisation in this area, following the liberalisation of BT in the late '70s)

Well I always knew that my uncle was lucky to be alive, but now it sounds like there was someone upstairs watching over him that day.

Does anyone else know of anyone who has come into such direct contact with the juice rail and lived to tell the tale?