How Electrical Bonding Can Save Your Life

WORDS AND PHOTOS BY LEGACY EV

AS cooler months descend upon us, so do tacky wool sweaters. If you’ve had the opportunity to wear one for an ugly sweater party, you may have also experienced becoming a conduit for unexpected static shock as you grabbed the serving spoon in the punch bowl. While unpleasant, this phenomenon can teach us a great deal about electric vehicle safety systems that can keep builders or repairers working on them safer from electric shock.

What is Potential Equalization?

When you felt that jolt of electricity passing through your hand and onto the metal serving spoon, you were experiencing a “potential equalization” across two different materials. You—and the thing you touched—were at two different electric potentials, or “voltages.” When you and that spoon got close enough together, the shock you felt was the differing potentials becoming equalized. Had you and the spoon been at the same electric potential, the shock would have never occurred.