Electricity's Danger to Dummies

Typical circuit breaker

Electric power has made modern life easy compared to the lives of even our grandparents' generation. Considering how ubiquitous electrical devices are in our lives, it's puzzling to us that so many people are so completely ignorant of the subject. Wouldn't you know, however, that even though ignorant as babes about electricity and electronics, some freelancers are perfectly happy to expound if they think doing so will garner them a few pennies. Take, for instance, Joan Whetzel (again!), writing about "Home Circuit Breakers" at HubPages.com...

Joan's misstatements begin in the introduction, when she (mis)informs her readers that circuit breakers are in place, in part, to prevent "[e]xcessive current coming into the house." They're not: they're in place to prevent overloaded circuits within the house. Whatever.

After babbling about the history of circuit breakers and comparing them to fuses (although never actually mentioning how a circuit breaker (or a fuse, for that matter) works, Ms Whetzel next informs us of the following:

"Ifproblems [sic] with the circuit breakers or circuit breaker panel are suspected, one way the homeowner can do a preliminary check is with the use of a voltmeter, which will show whether each circuit breaker is getting power."

Duh. OK, Joanie, so how do we do this?

Remove the cover from the circuit breaker panel. Place one of the voltmeter's probes on a circuit breaker terminal screw. Place the other probe to "ground." (Note that one of the probes will be red in color and the other will be black). "Ground" could be any metal part of the circuit panel casing. Warning: Don't touch the voltmeter probes to exposed wire, but instead place them on the plastic or rubber outer casing surrounding the wire. Any exposed wire will send out a jolt of electricity. Check the voltmeter screen to obtain the reading.

We especially like Ms Whetzel's advice to touch your voltmeter's probe to the "plastic or rubber outer casing surrounding the wire," by which we assume she means "insulation." Of course, if you do that, your voltmeter won't read any current... Dumbass.

Whetzel says nothing about what this mysterious "reading" should be, what you're measuring, or which terminal screw you should use in your measurement. We're not going to give you that information; if you're stupid enough to read this woman's content on HubPages or eHow, you probably deserve a good 110-volt jolt.

In short, bad advice that, even worse, is dangerous. Dumb, dumb, dumbass: Dumbass of the Day!

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DD - ELECTRICAL