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Comment by perryizgr8 | Hacker News Reader

I don't buy the "it's too dangerous because of high voltage" argument. Ice cars have literally a bomb chamber within along with an assortment of fans and belts and hot liquids that will burn and maim you if you don't know what you're doing. But regular users have survived for a century with cars.

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Most service techs turn off the car (ICE) before working on it. So it's usually very clear if your hand can be caught by a fan belt or not (and not deadly if it is). When turned off and 12v battery disconnected, a car is pretty darn safe.

Are you sure you can sense high voltage / high amperage as well?

Great story from my mechanic about how that one time they started a diesel and couldn't get it to stop. They even tried throwing rags into the intake. Then there was that time I had a rusty gas tank that we discovered when it leaked gasoline all over the shop till we got a drum under it. Or that time my car fell of its jacks (don't ask) and nearly broke both my legs.

Likely that diesel was sucking up engine oil through the turbo bearing that failed. This is the way for turbodiesels to die a horrible death.

You can feel burning stuff from a distance using your regular caveman-era human hardware. Not necessarily high voltage electricity.

Still nowhere near as dangerous as high voltage, especially given that an ICE has a very clear "engine is now on and angry" state, which doesn't exist in the same way for an electric car.

Working on an EV with the batteries connected is like working on the fuel system of an internal combustion engine with a lighter for illumination. You've got the massive pile of potential energy _and_ the means to release it at your literal fingertips

>literally a bomb chamber

EVs have airbags too, which are also pointed at your face.

If by a "bomb chamber" you mean the engine cylinders, I'm not an expert, but many people say that burning fuel is technically "deflagration" or rapid burning, and if fuel explodes whether in the engine or elsewhere that is abnormal. Also see: detonation.

Apart from that, when engines blow up real good, isn't it usually at some time other than when they are turned off or idling as a mechanic looks under the hood?

I'm not saying they can't be dangerous, but there are some qualifications that mitigate the comparison to high voltage, I think.

But regular users have survived for a century with cars.

Most of them have, yes. But if you think the comparison apt, Mercedes doesn't want you opening the hood for probably good reason.

It would be quite hard to kill yourself with an internal combustion engine. I mean... it's probably possible (somehow spray yourself with petrol, and then ignite it?) but it wouldn't be at all likely. The same can't really be said of electric car guts.

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