Hi!, in my previous video about getting electrocuted in a bathtub,
I briefly mentioned suicide showers.
Which is what people call them because you have to bring
live wires with you in the bathroom to heat the water.
But then, there were tons of comments, mostly from my beloved Brazilian
viewers that were shocked by my comments.
*chuckles* shocked!
Saying that millions of people's there use this showerhead with no problems.
There was this outpour of people in the streets demanding my exile.
Just kidding.
But seriously, it seems like a majority of people there, as well as some other countries
like Mexico use these shower heads and people seem to be okay.
I didn't want to make this video because bigclive and DiodeGoneWIld
have already made good videos on the topic, and me being a
bigger channel, my video would probably pop first pushing their videos down getting more views.
Ok, let's do it, but I'll pick a different title
so that our videos won't show in the same search.
So I bought one of these from Amazon to try and see if I survive.
Since you can buy these in Canada, you would assume that it's tested and safe.
I'm starting to doubt our system...
Let's see what's inside the suicide shower and if it is truly suicidal.
Okay, so here we have two bare heating elements for two heat settings
that are completely exposed to the running water without isolation.
There is a diaphragm back here that when there is pressure from running water,
it switches the contacts on to make sure the elements
are only powered when there is running water.
Otherwise, the whole thing would melt and burn in fire. The damn thing draws 50 amps max.
The ground wire goes in the middle of the diaphragm to ground the water at the output and
also goes straight into the input water to ground the input as well.
Now the question is, would this be enough to ensure the water
pouring on your head is not equivalent to live wire and
electrocute your brain cells. The structure of this shower is kind of smart,
I don't know if it's the same case for all of them,
but, the entire water passing over the live wires must go through
this hole first before getting out where the ground wire is sitting at the middle.
So it might be possible for the ground wire to remove all the charges from the water before getting out.
Now, I'm not saying it's impossible to have a safe water heater with you in the shower.
It's actually simple to make. See if the heating element is isolated from live wires like these oven elements,
then there is no problem. If I turn it on and touch the element,
there is no electricity on the surface, just heat. These run on 240 volt AC and are safe to touch.
Can't remove it.
If I turn it on, I read
204 volts?
Oh, right because at my home the voltage, is made from the difference between
220 volt AC phases 120 degrees apart. Now if I change the volume, the voltage should change.
Oh, maybe it's doing some special way for modulation like PWM
or a light dimmer and my meter is not detecting it well.
So I brought my scope here to check the actual waveform using my
differential probe because I don't want to accidentally short the program to 200 volt AC
Oh wait. I just remembered something.
CircuitSpecialists sent me a new tool that could be pretty helpful here.
There.
Then sent me a handheld oscilloscope.
This is a 70MHz-2-channel oscilloscope with its own 25MHz function generator and a
complete digital multimeter. I mean if it works well, it will make life much easier for some measurements.
It runs on battery or isolated USB power so it would be completely isolated from
live wires and it's much more portable. I'll continue using it throughout the video
to check its performance. I mean for around 200V AC, I mean
$200, it's pretty affordable and
I'll giveaway 10 of them at the end of the video.
Checking the voltage first...
Yep, the screen is pretty adequate for a multimeter.
But voltage still doesn't change by the volume. It comes with one probe...
But fortunately, I have more. Okay, let's check the voltage.
There you go!
Well, the display is a bit small for a scope, but I mean it's a handheld scope and it is still pretty clear.
But the voltage...
Still doesn't change by the volume.
Well, maybe I have to load it with the elements so the proper waveform shows up.
I tied some wires to the element terminal so I can probe them.
Now if I turn on the voltage- [Plug pops]
SH***T
Let me use some electric tape.
Damnit! Now the oven doesn't turn off!
Have to figure out what's going on. Maybe it's a stuck relay.
There is not much going on here.
Maybe these switches stuck or something.
Okay, so this contact was welded to the one below, but they are disconnected now.
You know, probing stuff, you have to be more careful. Well, I did find some leads in...
garbage thrown back here.
Hey! Back in business.
Hopefully nothing gets shorted again. Just note that there is no ground between these two wires.
Each one is one phase. Both dangerous!
There we go.
The hell?!
The voltage still doesn't change! How does it adjust the temperat-
Oo, turned off?
Oh s***
Such an idiot! Yep. I'm an idiot!
You work with fancy PWM control systems to drive loads and motors so much
you forget stupid stuff like this oven work in simple ways!
This thing is just one minute on, one minute off, one minute on, one minute off
and the on/off duration is controlled by this...
knob
Was it calling it a volume all this time? I'm not recording all that s*** again.
The point is, this showerhead could also be made of such an isolated heating element with proper
electronics to more precisely control the heat
Let's go install it.
I don't have a power outlet right here,
unlike what it shows in the installation sheet, which is good.
I mean, you don't want to live wire with you in the bathtub,
but I guess it's okay in some countries. Survival of the fittest.
But this length of wire is not enough anyway.
Okay, so I wired everything up and plugged in my power into the
GFCI outlet to prevent me from death. Let's turn it on
[Water sprinkling]
Well, I was expecting the GFCI to pop
So I connected my amp meter in series with the ground wire to see how much current
is going through the ground and it's a little bit less than point 8 milliamps - which is not a lot.
It is still good enough to give you a little bit of shock
but it's much less than the 5 milliamp limit that the
GFCI trips at. This amount of current depends on the quality of water and the voltage.
So if you're in a country with 240 volt AC and more impure water,
this current might be too much that will trip (the) GFCI.
For example, the tap hot water is more conductive and if I make it more,
you see that the ground wire current is rising. I've heard in some countries,
they disconnect the ground wire to make this work and that makes *this* much more dangerous.
Sh**, the room breaker popped.
How much current is it drawing?
I set it to minimum and the breaker still popped. Let's measure the current.
Another tool from circuit specialists.
It's 19 amps!
So if you want to fully use this, not only you have to make sure you have
at least a 50 amp breaker, you have to make sure the house wiring
is rated for 50 amps. Otherwise, you'll set the whole thing on fire.
Now I'm going to measure the AC voltage between the water,
which I'll probe with a spoon, to the faucet which is my ground.
And if I probe from far, you see that there is no AC voltage because the water droplets are disconnected.
But if I get close, I
read as high as 7V AC.
[SNIFFING]
I can smell wires burning now. So the voltage is not high enough to give you a shock over your skin.
But if it goes into your eyes or mouth, it could really hurt. Okay, let's try it
I put one foot on the drain as ground and bring my tongue as close as possible.
Yeah, I feel nothing!
Okay, so although there is voltage, there might be a very high resistance series
with it so that when you get in the way, that voltage drops to zero.
Okay, let's measure the AC voltage again
but this time, I'll put my body parallel to it to see what happens
to the voltage. See? From around 5 volts when I touch it,
It drops to like, 0.7 volts
So this confirms that, in my setup, this water cannot supply
high voltage or current to shock you. So, I hate to say it,
But beside these loose wires and the fact that it may
set your house on fire, It seems pretty safe.
But I mean, this is left to people to install and you know
people they may not connect the ground properly.
Let's see what happens in that case.
Now, it is connected the ground wire and if I probe the water,
I get
Close to 45 volts! Now if I touch the spoon, the voltage drops to around 2 volts.
Still hurt if it gets into your mouth.
Still nothing. Which is good I guess...
So if this is installed absolutely correctly by a professional and it never fails
considering its questionable quality,
Then you might be safe.
Knowing that there is a little bit of current
constantly running through you when you are taking a shower.
That tiny current draw would be double or more in countries with
240 volt AC which might still be safe on the other hand,
the current draw from the power lines would be half.
So it's safer that way. Maybe it won't give you a shock,
maybe you won't accidentally touch the hanging loose wires,
or set your home on fire or get cancer over time.
All I know is that, this thing actually proved itself
to be quite useful and I'll give away 10 of these.
♪ GIVEAWAY TIME!!! ♪
Well, I already said it. Thanks to CircuitSpecialists,
I'll give away 5 of these to my patrons at patreon.com
Who are always in the draw and 5 more to the viewers
who can register for free from the link in the description.
Sometimes things I give away are too expensive, but this thing
at around $200 is all the essential things you need for electronics.
Except it's not a soldering iron.
Is it? No.
Disappointed.
And circuit specialist is like a treasure box of all these good equipment.
I have tons of things from them here,
and if you use the promo called "ElectroBOOM" at checkout, you get 10% off. So, do electronics.
*Unibrow dance*