# Question about electrifying a car.



## ironpony (Dec 20, 2018)

For my story, I had a situation in mind where two people are trapped in a car that is being electrified.  They try to drive away but the electricity destroys the car from being drivable.

But I was wondering if this was possible, or would that take too long believably?  And how would a car become electrified in the first place?  Does anyone know more about this?


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## Dluuni (Dec 20, 2018)

Okay, so I once saw a safety video from and electric company I believe, about safety from fallen power lines. In the video, a driver was forced off the road by a typical distracted driving incident, and hit a power line. The power line fell on the car and the car was electrified. It was noted that the electricity was not going to really negatively affect the car, but the fact that the car had hit the pole had. So the first point was that the driver was going to just sit in the car and wait for rescue.


Then, to force action, the car lit on fire. So, the driver opened the door, stood at the edge of the door with his feet together, then hopped away from the car as far as possible, with his feet together so that the difference of charge between two different points of the ground would not create a current through his legs. Then, he shuffled with extremely small steps until he was about 35 feet away. (They specified that number)


The body of a car is made out of metal, which is conductive. This creates a Faraday cage effect, meaning that vast amounts of energy can pass through the body of the vehicle without affecting the contents. You are probably going to need to immobilize the vehicle in some other way.


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## ironpony (Dec 20, 2018)

Oh okay hmmm.  Isn't the car motor made out of metal too though, and doesn't have some kind of change of catching some of the electricity?  I also talked about it with friend, and he said that he believed that if the electricity from power lines for example, were to pass through a car, that this could cause the tires to heat up and explode he thinks, thus immobilizing it.  Is that true?


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## Dluuni (Dec 20, 2018)

You can drive a car with flat tires, it's just going to tear up the rims. The engine will absolutely pick up electricity, but it's a block of conductive metal. Metal airplanes get hit by lightning strikes all the time without incident, it's the composite plastic ones that have issues with them. Electricity alone won't give a modern car issues, but it might mess up a futuristic car if the materials in the body change or if the electronics get sufficiently inseparable.


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## Terry D (Dec 20, 2018)

Electricity causes problems (and does its job) when it passes through a conductive material into the ground. In the case of a car, when it becomes electrified, as when a downed power line touches its body, or chassis, there is no problem until some portion of the car becomes grounded. Once the electricity has a path to the ground it begins to flow creating current. The flow of current can damage a car's electronic components to varying degrees depending on the strength of the current. Usually a cars rubber tires insulate it from the ground so no current flows. The problems for people in cars that have been electrified occur when they try to get out of the car. As soon as their feet hit the ground (even in rubber-soled shoes) they provide the path to ground (if they are touching any of the cars charged components) and they are electrocuted as the current passes through them. It is theoretically possible to drive a car safely out from under, or over, a downed power line, but there are lots of variables which make it a stupid thing to do. One variable is the strength of the current in power line. A sufficiently strong current can find its own path to ground by 'jumping' the gap (arcing) between the charged vehicle and the ground in spite of the insulation provided by the tires. Think of a spark jumping between your finger and a light switch on a cold, dry winter day. It's the same concept. 

To sum it all up; a car that has been electrically charged by coming in contact with a power source will be fine, and its passengers safe unless it becomes grounded, then many different things can happen -- most of them bad. But tires heating up and bursting into flame isn't one of them.


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## ironpony (Dec 20, 2018)

Oh okay thanks, this new information gives me different ways to possibly play around with it then.  Maybe it won't stop the car, but it can provide different scenarios to work with.  I thought the electronics would be fried in the car, and thought that the engines of modern cars were probably activated by electronics.


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## Jack of all trades (Dec 20, 2018)

ironpony said:


> For my story, I had a situation in mind where two people are trapped in a car that is being electrified.  They try to drive away but the electricity destroys the car from being drivable.
> 
> But I was wondering if this was possible, or would that take too long believably?  And how would a car become electrified in the first place?  Does anyone know more about this?



I Googled "people trapped in car under power lines" and got these results. Maybe they'll help. 

http://www.google.com/url?q=https:/...AB4QtwIICzAA&usg=AOvVaw2dt4YevL-779u6HkripMD4

http://www.google.com/url?q=https:/...AB4QtwIIDjAB&usg=AOvVaw2A_FA-XKYTJSa-8Ix38P1Q

http://www.google.com/url?q=https:/...AB4QtwIIETAC&usg=AOvVaw1y-iY1j0FbDWpjMEn-XSd4

http://www.google.com/url?q=https:/...AB4QtwIIIDAH&usg=AOvVaw0-Z20fQixKxgNhTrGjMhdi

http://www.google.com/url?q=https:/...AB4QtwIIHTAG&usg=AOvVaw1MLu0Ep0ICgef8NN9uovnD


I think there was a time when cars had metal bodies, and a lot of metal on the inside as well. Now it's still a problem, but different.


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