Officially, the term “taser” refers to a particular brand of projectile-firing electric stun gun. However, the word is also colloquially used to refer to just about any device intended for delivering electric shocks to an adversary. The taser ring from [Penguin DIY] definitely fits that description, though we’d strictly advise you not to consider building this at home.
The build is a hacky one. An arc generator circuit was pulled out from a jet cigarette lighter, and reconfigured to fit in a small ring-based form factor. It was hooked up with a power switch and a small bank of 30 mAh lithium polymer cell for power, and a compact USB-C charger board was installed to keep the batteries juiced. The electronics were then delicately assembled into a ring-shaped mold, which was injected with resin to produce the final ring. Once cast, a pair of small metal electrodes were installed on the outside. Activating the taser function is as simple as squeezing the ring—easy to do just by making a fist.
We’ve seen projects like these before; our advice is usually to avoid them unless you really know what you’re doing. Whether you end up shocking someone else or accidentally shocking yourself, the results tend to be bad. The latter seems particularly easy to do if you’re wearing this thing on your finger. Given it’s a ring, don’t expect to be able to pull it off in a hurry, either. It’s hard to see how that ends well.
“TASER” name origin == Tom Alva Swift Electric Rifle
I think Taylor Swift invented it actually
🤓
Came here to say the same. Thomas A. Swift’s Electric Rifle.
Book is even in the public domain now.
It’s worth noting that this probably doesn’t actually work well as a stun gun. There’s more to incapacitating someone with electric shocks than simply producing a few kilovolts. Real TASERs are tuned to disrupt muscle control making it impossible for your victim to fight back. Even cheap stun guns are usually designed to deliver a bigger wallop and cause enough pain for whoever you shock to stop whatever they’re doing. The electric lighter circuits this thing is based on can give you a tiny burn but mostly they’ll just sting. Not that it’s safe to hit someone with them.
All the more reason not to build it. The risk has very little reward.
That is not at all the point I was making. This thing is based on the guts of a lighter. In other words it is specifically designed to burn things. It absolutely is dangerous and stupid to make.
I just wanted to point out that as dangerous as it is it’s probably not an effective deterrent. Anyone behaving in a way that makes hitting them with a stun gun seem like a good idea is probably going to shrug off the small burn this will give them. It’s not going to forcibly incapacitate them or deliver enough pain to stop them. What it will probably do is set your pants on fire before you ever get the chance to use it.
So it’s super dangerous, but not an effective deterrent? 😂 I feel like you have to pick one. It’s clearly a toy or a conversation piece (actually a stunt for youtube ad money)–nobody is defending their life with this thing
Do you seriously think there is no such thing as a badly designed weapon more dangerous to it’s wielder than their opponent? This device is probably going to do no more harm than give someone a mild shock or surface burn which makes it unreliable as a weapon and ineffective as a deterrent. But it can potentially light the wearer’s clothing on fire or deliver a more potent shock if something goes wrong. That makes it dangerous.
Yes it can be both.
“Impossible” to fight back… hopefully.
Even with real taster, it’s not uncommon for the police here shoot someone a few times to get them to go down, and sometimes they have to resort to a conventional weapon.
Under ideal conditions the pulses from a TASER cause all your muscles to constrict making it literally impossible to do anything other than fall over as your body seizes up. In practice there can be all sorts of issues from the barbs hitting lose or thick clothing, to bad placement on the body, to straight up missing their target. Still I don’t personally find “the police shoot someone a few times” to be compelling evidence that the weapon in question isn’t effective.
But regardless the main point I’m trying to stress is however well a true TASER might work this ring thing will not work nearly as well. Even if you build it and use it without hurting yourself do not expect it to save you in a bad situation.
Placement of the prongs is also key. The optimal distance to hit a target from is around 15ft or so, so the prongs ideally hit the person with about 3ft of distance between them giving the electrons a longer path through the body to travel. Too close and the prongs will hit closers on the body making a shorter path which is less effective. Its also interesting to note, that if the person is standing in water, they dont work at all.
Source: My cousin is a police officer and on SWAT. In their training he had to be tasered at the optimal distance and from sub-optimal distances to have first hand experience. Either way he said he went down, but from the close up distance he was able to fight it a little which resulted in him having to be tased for a more prolonged period of time, which frowned upon in courts.
Oh, I don’t know. If someone was expecting just a punch and got this with it they might be surprised long enough for you to get in a really good hit with the other fist.
But if you think you are just going to jab with it once and your work is over… yah… you are probably about to get beat up.
Honestly the punch itself and the little metal barbs cutting your face would completely overshadow the spark, I kind of doubt the recipient would notice
Unless of course you wear some biker gloves, put 4 of them on each hand, then rename yourself to a batman style villain or “the ghost who walks”
Not commenting on the wisdom of creating such an object: It’s clearly cooked up for the clicks, but that’s pretty nice work. And good video production too.
I’ll agree to that assessment!
I’d love to watch it because it’s probably one of the most amazing devices ever created, but when I click “play” NoScript says it contains \<media> element (a virus).
Weird that, as media elements aren’t viruses. You might need to rethink your approach to cyber security.
A media element is not a virus. You clearly have no idea what you’re doing.
Some media is definitely a virus but not the type that will infect a computer :x
I 2nd the notion that a ‘stun gun’ (not a taser, which produces muscle contractions) is worse than useless for defense. See video linked below for a demo.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=me60gWzbMXw
Real tasers are legit though, I’ve seen division of wildlife staff taser a large adult bear (hazing it when eating trash) up close, and it knocked the bear down hard.
This thing is more likely to start a fire than do anyone any good, just yt content for the sake of content imo
Stun guns are mostly for intimidation (loud crackling noise and bright sparks) or Jackass-esque stunts and pranks
Made me laugh this. Can imagine someone using that on an individual and once the intended target gets over the initial shock i’d suspect the ring wearer would be on his back very soon with a broken nose. Nothing like an unexpected shock to really get someone’s heckles up 😂
Yes, I’m sure that little toy could raise a few heckles.
Well you can always use it to light your opponents cigarette before they smack you.
Very classy move tbh
Pretty well done, nice build, effective deterrent as your oponent won’t be checking google to see if this probably doesn’t actually work well as a stun gun , it will you some precious seconds when they are needed. Anything can be a weapon. Sometimes I don’t get why people is so acidic in they comments.
Nice! May not be practical, but that’s okay.
White rooms (no lead paint) and round corners (so can’t hurt one’s self) with a rubber floor, high ceiling and no furniture to run into ‘may’ work for some people to stop acidic comments on ‘safety’ :) . When really it is up to ‘you’ how much risk you want to take. And to think as kids we played around with ‘real’ black powder and real good split your fingers type firecrackers…. and actually had fun in chemistry class. What is society coming too now-a-days.
Those were the days, weren’t they? btw are you a trader?
Taser brass knuckles.
Super fun project. Would be tons of fun at the frat house not so much effective in the streets for all the reasons listed above.
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I remember in college somewhere a dude mounted a static generator in his shoe or something and could then shock the bejeezus out of “friends”. They were called “pikashoes”
Please track him down and have him submit an article!
In fiction you often see vehicles or armor that electrocutes anyone who touches it, but doing that with a single conductive surface would require a ground connection as well and could be troublesome if the attacker isn’t barefoot. I had an idea similar to this that involved covering a nonconductive surface with a whole grid of electrodes such that if anyone touched any part of it (the electrodes being close enough together that a palm would bridge several opposite-polarity pairs), a taser-like system would be able to discharge through the grid and zap the attacker.
This is how “bug zappers” work and also how novelty electric fly swatters. And raisers and stun guns and cattle prods and …
This is like a modern day Bob E. Iannini project!
A shocking fingerring.
This thing does indeed look quit dangerous.
It probably hurts your “opponent” just enough to make him really angry.
When my friend bought a hand-held stun gun I asked him to try it in me. I could take 5 seconds of it on my stomach before it was too painful. That little ring is a funny toy but would be much more functional in repelling an attacker if it were a solid lead band.