Broken Electronics

[AmpFetish]

So I was in Europe for the past two weeks, and had to use an electrical adapter for my American plugs. What no one told me is that you couldn't use hair dryers, as they have an INSANE voltage. So I blew out the adapter, and the smell of burnt electronics filled the air.

But then I remembered....broken/burnt electronics is a huge part of my spectrum of the ASFR fetish, malfunctions. I realized how awful it would smell if you were with a malfunctioning fembot. Especially if you're having sex. You would need a chemical mask to keep out the toxic smoke. It definitely wouldn't be good to breathe that in.

Just a thought. But it sucks. I'll just keep it to fantasy that the smell doesn't exist. What part of the fetish wouldn't translate well to reality for you?

[KingJeremy]

Dude I blew out a power supply on my computer once. I couldn't figure out what the hell the smell was, it was like a cross between smelling salts and rubbing alcohol. But it was thick and acrid, definitely not something I'd want to breathe in for any amount of time.

[DukeNukem 2417]

Funny you should mention that....seeign as how The V.I.C.I. Diaries deals less with sexy-time and more with fembot vs fembot fighting (on occasion), the smell of a place after Vicki beats down an enemy fembot probably wouldn't be all that appealing.....

(runs off to write a few quick smell-based jokes for the finale of "Valley of the Damned")

[darkbutflashy]

I don't get why it's often the *electronics* that fails in the stories. The only means of failure are overheating (no fumes at all) and short-circuit. The latter produce a lot of fumes, but it's unlikely to happen when there's no mains voltage applied, as all the power distribution in a machine has fast current limiting everywhere (that's state of the art). Plus, in both cases the circuit dies a sudden death, not much story to tell after that.

I like mechanic failure better. It's far more likely, the smell of spilled oil isn't that gross (some characters/readers may even like it) and the broken part works a while after the failure so there's room for storytelling.

What part of the fetish wouldn't translate well to reality for you?

Uh, anything?

[dale coba]

I don't get why it's often the *electronics* that fails in the stories.

I think it was because in several decades of the early 20th Century, radios and then t.v.'s had vacuum tubes which could pop, explode, with a spark and some smoke. I doubt anyone's house ever burned down, but that mode of failure of an electrical device common to every home left a mark on pop culture.

- Dale Coba

[tectile]

I don't get why it's often the *electronics* that fails in the stories.

I think it was because in several decades of the early 20th Century, radios and then t.v.'s had vacuum tubes which could pop, explode, with a spark and some smoke. I doubt anyone's house ever burned down, but that mode of failure of an electrical device common to every home left a mark on pop culture.

- Dale Coba

I have a few thoughts.

I work on antique electronics for a living and some modern gear as well. There is nothing sexy about burned wires, blown transformers, failed capacitors etc. It just smells bad and the smoke and residue left contains carcinogens you don't want to inhale.

In order for a fembot to move around and do the things we would want her to do requires a substantial amount of energy. This could be from a super battery we haven't invented yet or a miniature cold fusion reactor we haven't invented yet etc. Who knows what the power source would be but when you have a substantial amount of power available you also have the potential for catastrophic failure. The old joke. What do you call a guy who graduated at the bottom of his medical school class? Doctor. The same is true for electrical engineers.

I would not want my fembot to be programmed to glitch or malfunction. I would just think "She's just running glitch 301B again" and that just not sexy. It would have to to be a real glitch or malfunction to be stimulating.

Dale, I'm not sure what you were saying about house fires. Faulty electronic equipment causes house fires all the time

I may have taken this thread off the rails so I'll shut up now.

[dale coba]

tectile, I was thinking that the imagery of exploding tubes was much over-represented, compared to how often either a home radio or early t.v. actually caught fire. From how deeply rooted this imagery is, you'd expect there were several models that blew up and caught fire regularly enough that many Americans had seen it themselves.

For those who worked in film or t.v. or radio station electronics, industrial-level power use, those guys saw/heard giant lamps and equipment blow out as part of their work. I think the audience learned the imagery mostly from the industry, and not because it happened in their homes. An electrical fire starting from household equipment, at household power levels, will burn a house down, but it's not often going to be flash*pop#smoke*sparks like a "malfunctioning robot".

There may well be some device or experience I don't know of, a car engine explosion of some sort, that left an impression on consumers. My estimate is that Art wasn't really imitating Life as the audience personally had experienced.

- Dale Coba (BOOM!)

[Windblade]

Sometimes burnt electronic components don't have any smell at all. Here is an example: at the end of previous year my PC's power supply unit died because of voltage spike (yeah, a very "nice" present for New Year and Christmas). PSU's power controller was completely burned (because of this, I bought a completely new PSU), and motherboard's chipset died too (it was fixed, but I'm still afraid to turn on my old PC). But there was absolutely no smell.


> What part of the fetish wouldn't translate well to reality for you?

Hmmmmm...
I like repairs. But in reality I have a big problem with them: I'm afraid to touch internal components of electronic devices because my hands often discharge static electricity (I don't know why; maybe I have a superpower, lol). Maybe an antistatic (grounding) bracelet may help... But it's not very comfortable.