Computer Question

[CauseISaidSo]

CISS, so you’re taking it easy on Yugoboy by not telling him to set the dial to amps and “test” the meter by putting the leads into the 110v socket? Where’s the fun?

I thought you put it on MegOhms and stuck one lead into a open cut on each hand?

Remind me to never lend a meter to either of you two! Besides, everyone knows you shouldn’t risk a nice meter to check the mains when a fork will work perfectly fine. 😉

[Yugoboy]

That’s a lot of directions…

I’ll see if I can find the meter this weekend. I’ll get back to you if anything’s off.

As for jamming anything into a wall socket… that’s a lesson I learned as a tiny tot playing with one of the old-style coffee warmers. My wife nearly killed herself last year playing with the batteries on the camper… while it was still plugged into the house! A gold ring on her thumb tried to melt itself there.

Electricity is something I try not to screw with. I’m dumb enough to do something that would permanently maim me. It’s like car repair… I’m certain I could repair my brakes. I can change oil, I can change starters, alternators, thermostats, fan belts, etc… but screwing up the brakes could end up really badly. They may be easy, but I’d rather let the pros do that.

[CauseISaidSo]

I’d try that last tip before breaking out the meter, Yugoboy. That’s what’s happened to every power brick gone bad that I’ve come across. Never actually seen the brick itself go bad.

And fear of electricity is a good thing. When you stop being afraid of it is when you start being complacent around it, and that’s when it’s gonna bite ya.

My plugging-things-into-the-wall story: This wasn’t me, but a childhood friend. Y’all remember those race cars that had a small rechargeable battery in them and a thing that looked like a gas pump that you recharged them with? They were about the same size as but weren’t slot cars; the track didn’t have any metal or guide rails and you couldn’t control the speed of the cars. I think maybe they were called Sizzlers. Anyway, the gas pump thing held like 4 D batteries and you’d stick this cord that looked like a pump hose into the side of the car and press down on the top of the pump for 30 seconds or so and it’d give the car a charge good enough for several runs. And these things would really fly (usually right off the track if it wasn’t perfectly set up).

Well, my friend got the idea that if 4 D batteries were good, then surely juice from the wall was better, so he stripped a cord, wired it to the terminals where the batteries normally connected and plugged it into the wall. To say he let the magic smoke out of the car would be a severe understatement; there wasn’t just magic smoke, he conjured up the magic fire as well.

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