Is that stungun really dead?
Posted: Sat Sep 01, 2007 2:11 pm
The cheapo stungun most of us use are really not very well made. (What do you expect for ~$10?)
Folks have posted that their stunguns quite working after a while. Mine recently "quite working".
Still makes the ticking sound and the faint high pitched whine. No spark between the probes. A new battery didn't make any difference.
I suspect that a lot of "dead" stunguns have just developed internal arcs. That is, they have found a pair of electrical points within the gun, that are at high voltage, and closer together than the default/safety gap spacing.
On my "100,000 volt" stungun the default gap is ~0.75". Apparently the gun has found a shorter path somewhere internally.
Turns out this really does not affect the performance of the gun all that much. If you use a conductor (like a well insulated length of wire) and shorten the default, or working, gap then the stungun will work again. Since a typical spudgun, even with a couple spark gaps, probably has a total spark distance much less than the default gap the stungun should still work as an ignition source.
So, if the gun still makes the clicking sound, but doesn't produce sparks across it's electrodes, there is a good chance that it'll still work on a spudgun. Just shorten up the gun's gap(s) until you get a spark.
BTW, anybody ever get a "100,000 K Volt Muscleman" stungun apart? (No screws except one that holds the belt clip.)
Folks have posted that their stunguns quite working after a while. Mine recently "quite working".
Still makes the ticking sound and the faint high pitched whine. No spark between the probes. A new battery didn't make any difference.
I suspect that a lot of "dead" stunguns have just developed internal arcs. That is, they have found a pair of electrical points within the gun, that are at high voltage, and closer together than the default/safety gap spacing.
On my "100,000 volt" stungun the default gap is ~0.75". Apparently the gun has found a shorter path somewhere internally.
Turns out this really does not affect the performance of the gun all that much. If you use a conductor (like a well insulated length of wire) and shorten the default, or working, gap then the stungun will work again. Since a typical spudgun, even with a couple spark gaps, probably has a total spark distance much less than the default gap the stungun should still work as an ignition source.
So, if the gun still makes the clicking sound, but doesn't produce sparks across it's electrodes, there is a good chance that it'll still work on a spudgun. Just shorten up the gun's gap(s) until you get a spark.
BTW, anybody ever get a "100,000 K Volt Muscleman" stungun apart? (No screws except one that holds the belt clip.)