Comments on: Fourth o’ July entertainment

By: Chris

Chris — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 19:23:54 +0000

I’m still trying to figure out how AC power will light the LEDs. Don’t leds only work with DC current? Also, if you hurt yourself doing this, you are just stupid or ignore proper safety procedures. Lastly, if you are not grounded, touching the hot dog wit ONE HAND/FINGER only “shouldn’t” give a shock…my high school electronics teacher demonstrated this to us many times….safely of course. Keep up the good work!!

By: akmixdown

akmixdown — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 15:49:50 +0000

I mixed nothing up; I mentioned the current rating of the power supply in order to prevent "yeah but your 12V supply had no capability to deliver current!" type of comments. Seems I got the opposite now. :-)

You're right, the heater wire of a 220V toaster will be different than that of a 110V toaster, and the resistance of the hot dog is the same in both cases, so it will draw more current (and thus cook faster) -- My comment was more in general of "ooh, it's 220V, it takes more power" and not so much specifically in this case.

As far as the poster saying some dumbshit will touch the cooking hot dog -- no big deal; unless you've just come out of the swimming pool and are standing on a grounded metal pad, you are highly unlikely to even feel a mild shock; the hot dog is simply a better conductor between the L and N than you are between L and ground. You *could* have a better capacitive path to ground and receive a shock that way, but that is highly unlikely.

In general: This is a very safe hack, even at 220V. Exposed house current is a little dangerous, but unless you're being colossally stupid the most you're going to do is trip the breaker or get a shock that'll set you on your ass.

By: Axel

Axel — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 10:43:40 +0000

that iBook is ingenious! It’s like some sort of well thought out pun! An iBook hidden inside a real book… pure genius, that’s all I can say..

By: n3rrd

n3rrd — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 07:37:01 +0000

@dennis:

electrolysis with alternating current? well, I guess you could try but you'll be there all day.

By: ed3

ed3 — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 06:36:20 +0000

bchafy: Thanks!! This is the one I was waxing lyrically about back at #6:

http://cgi.ebay.com/National-Presto-USA-Electric-Hot-Dogger-Cook-6-Hot-Dogs_W0QQitemZ330143589805QQihZ014QQcategoryZ982QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
http://cgi.ebay.com/Vintage-Presto-Hot-Dogger-Electric-Hot-Dog-Cooker-w-Box_W0QQitemZ220127769048QQihZ012QQcategoryZ116013QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

By: strider_mt2k

strider_mt2k — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 04:31:06 +0000

Think of it as evolution in action.

By: steve

steve — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 02:22:03 +0000

ahh mr. o’brien, the mr wizard reference takes me back. thanks :)

By: Wolf

Wolf — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 01:48:58 +0000

Amen muppit

By: bchafy

bchafy — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 01:09:52 +0000

I remember this...
Way back in the 70s, before the microwave oven was a common kitchen appliance, we had the Hot Dogger. Same idea, except maybe just slightly more safe and without the LED's.

You can still get them on ebay:
http://search.ebay.com/search/search.dll?sofocus=bs&sbrftog=1&from=R10&_trksid=m37&satitle=presto+%22hot+dogger%22&sacat=-1%26catref%3DC6&sargn=-1%26saslc%3D2&sadis=200&fpos=ZIP%2FPostal&sabfmts=1&saobfmts=insif&ftrt=1&ftrv=1&saprclo=&saprchi=&fsop=1%26fsoo%3D1&coaction=compare&copagenum=1&coentrypage=search

and since you can cook many dogs at the same time, the LED possibilites are almost limitless :)

By: stoopid muppit

stoopid muppit — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 01:04:31 +0000

0. place yellow DO NOT CROSS tape around cooking site.
1. place hotdog on plate
2. put on gloves to prevent accidental touching of sharp forks.
3. remove forks form drawer (report any accidental fork-stick injuries)
4. place forks on hotdogs. (You may want to mark the forks so you know how far to push them - use non toxic marker)
!WARNING! PUSHING forks too far will result in the opposite hand getting fork injuries
5. attach clips to forks - use 50 foot extention cord and plug in behind sandbagged bunker.
6. switch on for effect. (use megaphone to announce cooking zone is LIVE) observe results with standard binoculars.

when cooking complete:
7. switch off at wall.
8. unplug from wall. (announce cooking zone is SAFE)
9. carefully step over sandbags (sandbags are a common tripping hazard)
10. remove DO NOT CROSS tape.
11. remove sharp forks
12. ...see safety manual on handling hot objects

By: Dennis

Dennis — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 00:39:34 +0000

BTW, in regards to the comment by akmixdown, the fact that 220 volt appliances require only half the current of 110 volt ones is only because the devices are engineered for that! For instance, a toaster sold in the US might have a nominal heater resistance of 11 ohms. 110 volts / 11 ohms = 10 amps current. 10 amps x 110 volts = 1100 watts power. Now, that same brand toaster, when sold in the UK, would have to be built with a _different_ heater wire so that it would have 44 ohms resistance (four times as much resistance). 220 volts / 44 ohms = 5 amps current. 5 amps x 220 volts = 1100 watts power.

Yes, the toaster will have 1100 watts in both cases - but the heater resistance has to be _four_times_ as great to get that. Devices don't _magically_ draw half the current on 220 volts systems because they are getting more volts; it is because they are built for it.

The hot dog, however, has the same resistance whether you connect it to 220 or 110 volts. So the observation that appliances on 220 volt systems generally draw 1/2 the current is neither here nor there.

Say the hot dog has a nominal resistance of 110 ohms. 110 volts / 110 ohms = 1 amp current. 110 volts x 1 amp = 110 watts power if it's on a 110 volt system.

Take the same hot dog, same number of ohms. Hook it up to a 220 volt system and we have 220 volts / 110 ohms = 2 amps current. 220 volts x 2 amps current = 440 watts: four times as much as before.

giskard is right. akmixdown is wrong.

Also, sorry to keep nitpicking you, akmixdown, but it really bugs me when people confuse the _max_current_rating_ of a power supply with how much current is actually flowing through a system. When you say "a decent 12V/15A supply" it most certainly does *not* mean you actually had 15 amps flowing, and does *not* mean you cooked the hot dog at 180 watts! The 15 amps you mention is irrelevant. It doesn't matter if it's a 1.5 amp supply, or a 15 amp supply, or a 15,000,000 amp supply. That's just the most the supply can put out without damaging itself, not how much it puts out all the time! The only thing that controls how much current is flowing is the volts (12) and the resistance of the hot dog. Now I don't know what the resistance of a hot dog *is*, but let's use 110 ohms for the example again. That means that at 12 volts you actually had approximately just 0.1 amps flowing, which results in a meager 1.2 watts cooking power. That's why your hot dog took so long to cook.

By: larry sanchez

larry sanchez — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 00:20:05 +0000

And how many ‘stupid kids’ do you think read hack a day? Im not saying everyone on here is an adult (hell I’v been reading since I was 17) but for someone to understand most of the articles on here you would presume that they would have some sort of basic knoweledge on electronics. And I know one of the first things I was taught was not to mess with the mains, until I could understand it better. Saying that I’m now a qualified electrician/audio viusal technician and sometimes let my guard down and I get the odd shock :( But other than that, when I was a kid it was all AA batteries and 3v lamps….

By: devils advocate

devils advocate — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 23:02:07 +0000

This is dangerous enough, some stupid kid will touch the sausage and the saltwater in it will lower the resistance and kill or seriously harm him or her. Also this is kind of lame since all the projects on hack a day have appeared shortly before somewhere else. Either the make blog or endgadget. lame

By: spaceman spiff

spaceman spiff — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 21:46:01 +0000

Provided some basic precautions are taken this experiment is perfectly safe. It is hard to electrocute and kill yourself with 120V AC. Provided your skin is dry 120V will usually only give a mild shock. Dry skin has a resistance in the 10s of kiloOhms. AC starts to get dangerous at more then 10mA. You do the math.

This is not to say that I would recommend that anyone go stick their finger in a light socket. If a person has any number of heart conditions even a few mA could cause a heart attack.

Most people know that electricity can be dangerous. Most people would know that touching any of the bare metal could be bad and they would know to take precautions against that. In contrast most people would not know the dangers with the DIY diving contraption. There was apparently no attempt to outline those dangers (I did not see the site or video). Judging by the write up there was no attempt to mitigate any of the dangers either.

In this wiener roasting experiment stupidity and bad luck could result in serious injury or death. With the DIY diving rig good luck was the only thing preventing serious injury or death.

By: Dennis

Dennis — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 21:23:28 +0000

Supposing someone were to use copper wires or a fork containing a copper-alloy coating, what would be the effect? It would produce copper salts inside the hotdog. Here's what one site has to say about copper sulfate (one of many kinds of copper salts that would be produced): "copper sulfate has clinically been used as an emetic, and it was also a popular MURDER WEAPON and abortifacient in France in the 19TH century." (Emphasis mine.)

http://ceramic-materials.com/cermat/education/178.html