Thanks for the responses guys, I'm thinking I'll just throw this amp away and stick to my Mesas that, thus far, haven't tried to kill me... as yet...
aja wrote:
Sorry to hear about that, but I like your profile pic!
Maybe go to the doc. Internal burns are not good and hard to detect.
LOL, I've used that avatar for years, but only because I always wanted to release an album called "Danger of Death" with this image on the cover... you've made me realise how apt an avatar it is now!
On the more serious note, if my hand where I was holding onto the mic is only mildly singed, what are the chances of internal burns?? I've got to say that despite it being extremely unpleasant getting shocked like that, I found it moderately funny afterwards, but after reading the link that ez posted, I'm only now realising that this could have been fatal!
exsanguinator wrote:
South Africa has a very advanced state of electrical safety mechanisms,
so I would start with why didnt the earth leakage trip?
The amp needs to be meggared to see if theres any insulation issues as well
or even a simple earth continuity test on you amp plugtop
Then was it a mains shock or a capacitive one.. as tubes run on high voltage and have a ceramic or synthetic base insulating it from the frame,
which may be perished or cracked/broken.
High Voltage shocks but does not kill,
But high amperage kills on low voltage as well
If your place of practice has a modernish mains board and hasnt been tampered and didnt trip the breaker(short circuit trips the main switch,earth fault the Earth Leakage breaker)
Then I would look at the amp
Either way if youre not technically minded about these things,be prepared to pay up, get ripped off or both.
It didn't trip any breakers, the amp/desk/everything was all still on afterwards. In fact I was barefoot on a wooden parquet-style floor. If I read it right from ez's link, it sounds like my amp has a grounding problem that sends the voltage to the ground side of the jack and through the strings. I then closed the grounding "loop" by grabbing my mic, which the site says " is easily lethal because the path from the guitarist to earth ground has very little resistance to the flow of current". If that's what actually happened then I guess it's lucky I'm not ten toes up at this point... at least I now know it's unlikely that I have a heart condition, although I wouldn't suggest using this method to check one's ticker, at least not voluntarily!
