Is the voltage of a car battery enough to kill you?

Question

This is a weird question but... I was getting a jump on my car today and we accidentally messed up the jumper cables and the electricity was just flying. Out of morbid curiosity, if you were stupid enough to grab both ends of the cable, is the charge of a car battery enough to fatally electrocute a human? I guess I'm mostly curious out of fear lol.

Answer 1

I was told by a professor of electrical engineering at a major university that under the right circumstances it is possible for an automobile  battery to easily kill you. Enough said.

Answer 2

no it puts out 12 volts thats it. your safe

Answer 3

No the current in a car battery wont electricute you to death.  This is direct current. DC current.  

There are two things that you do however want to be careful to not do when playing with a car battery.

1.You dont want to become a ground when wearing jewelry.  Make sure you take watches rings and jewelry off whenever you are playing with jumper cables or batteries. The metal jewelry will ground out. In other words you will become the ground and the metal will heat up and burn into your skin if you touch other metal while holding the cables.

2. After you put the battery cables on a battery to charge, step away from it.  If the battery is bad it can explode and there will be acid flying everywhere which can also burn you. Make sure you wear gloves because the acid can burn your skin or put holes in your clothes.

Answer 4

It is not the volts that hurt you, it's the amperage.  A car

battery can kill you, there are hundreds of amps.

Answer 5

No. You can literally touch both terminal and you won't feel a thing.  A car battery is 12V.  You have to go up to past 50V before you even begin to feel any electricity (shock).

The reason you saw a spark is because when metal touched the terminals, there was a rush of CURRENT (not voltage).  That  can't happen with your skin.

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BUT if you were were to get hit with hot flying metal when the sparks fly, you can get a minor burn.

Good Luck...

P.S.  If you don't believe me, try touching 2 sides of the AA battery (1.5V).  You will feel nothing. Then touch 2 double A batteries end to end (3V). You will feel nothing.  And keep building the AA battery chain and you can safely build UP TO 12v and still feel nothing.

Or try touching both terminals of 9V (75%) of 12V.  You will feel absolutely nothing.

Answer 6

It sure is . If im not mistaken then all that is required are 2 volts under the right circumstances.

Most people are under the assumption that when connecting car leads the red lead provides the charge and therefore connected last.

This is wrong , the red lead should always be connected first as it is the black lead that actually provides the charge.

Answer 7

It wont kill you, but it may knock you out- if you are old and have a weak heart maybe.

Answer 8

nope, but it can seriously burn and shock you... but that answer is different for hybrid/electric cars, those batteries can kill

Answer 9

NO....If you put a voltage meter in a lemon,it will read at least 8.5 volts.

Answer 10

no it will just bite you not kill you.. it is almost simular to sticking a 9v battery to your tounge.

Answer 11

yes it is possible under the right circumstances being a standard car battery has 650amps which 3 amps can kill you whether it comes from ac or d/c power.. but your chances of death are like 1,000,000 to 1 i have been working on cars for years and the only thing that endangered my life was when i left a wedding ring on and that was burns from electrical current to the ring and i almost lost my finger and it got infected. i also am now in the military and i am an avionics engineer with extensive studies in electrical engineering with almost 3 bachelors degrees in related fields. if you grab both ends of the cables will not kill you if so stupid people everywhere would be dropping like flies.

Answer 12

No...it won't kill you....it won't even hurt you in the slightest.

I will admit..I'm not an electricity expert..and I'm not 100% on how electricity works....but....you can put jumper cables on a car battery...and spark the c**p out of them...and not think twice about it......it's only a small fireworks display...as far as the danger part is concerned.

Plenty will know more about the workings of electricity....but...not I..........sorry.