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Physics
Classical Physics
Electromagnetism
Let current from a Van de Graff generator flow through you
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[QUOTE="greypilgrim, post: 6123863, member: 490763"] Hi. I have two questions about the following video with a 200'000 V Van de Graaff generator: [MEDIA=youtube]ubZuSZYVBng[/MEDIA] [LIST=1] [*]At 5:57 he touches ground, apparently feeling nothing. He explains this with a very low current and proceeds that the current from a 120 V outlet is high and might kill you. But with ##I=U/R## and assuming the resistance of the body doesn't massively increase with voltage, shouldn't the current from the VdG generator still be more than a 1000 times higher? Or is there just not enough charge that accumulates on the sphere? If so, what happens with the voltage when he touches ground? Does it drop quickly such that ##I=U/R## can be satisfied with a very low ##I##?[*]At 4:44 and 7:45 he says that a lightning rod works by bleeding of the charge from a sharp point and doesn't actually attract lightning. This isn't what I read: Most sources argue that the sharp point creates a high electric field that partly ionizies the air around it and therefore make a lightning strike the rod more probable (which one could call "attract lightning"). Which one is true? [/LIST] [/QUOTE]
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Electromagnetism
Let current from a Van de Graff generator flow through you
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