From: dhky@shaw.ca   
      
   On 13/09/2013 4:34 PM, Salmon Egg wrote:   
   > In article , Don Kelly    
   > wrote:   
   >   
   >> You are right-  the battery would have been of the mid-40's vintage. It   
   >> was a fairly large dry cell (6"x9"x2") or thereabouts) ostensibly used   
   >> for an electric fence power supply (problem here would be short life -so   
   >> it could have been intended for something else-). The ignition coil was   
   >> "OLD" -well potted in a wood box, "trembler coil" type.   
   >> Did I risk fibrillation? -apparently not- some insulation as well as   
   >> being bypassed by the battery itself -limited current and let-go wasn't   
   >> a problem.   
   >   
   > I am not an expert on this. My guess is that the high voltage output for   
   > an electric fence would come from such a high impedance source, that   
   > there would be insufficient energy in a pulse to do much harm. Do you   
   > know of animals killed by an electric fence? I have heard from a   
   > reliable source that cattle could be killed through a barbed wire fence   
   > from a lightning strike--but that is something else entirely.   
   >   
   > Recently, I read a brief biography of Charles Kettering. I think he is   
   > the one who introduced the ignition point breaking system in the primary   
   > of an autotransformer. He probably also introduced a storage battery,   
   > starter, generator recharger, and self-starter into automobiles. I   
   > think, but do not know, that before that, dry cells were used for   
   > ignition. Also,I think that Ford coils ran continuously with a   
   > distributer. That should not be a hard thing to find out, but that is   
   > for another time.   
   >   
     Yes, as far as I know, the source was high impedance and was not   
   continuous in that the pulse rate was slow -about 1/sec-so energy   
   demands would be low.   
   Direct experience with an electric fence- startling but not harmful   
   pulses. That wasn't the case with the Ford coil- which was a different   
   experience- one shot was enough.   
   --   
   Don Kelly   
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