Ohmcraft, a division of Micropen Technologies, has made the high-voltage chip resistors used in conductive electrical weapons for more than 10 years. These devices, known as CEWs, are more often called stun guns. The company described that work in a release issued from Rochester, New York, on November 9, 2017.
Police officers carry stun guns, and so do private citizens who want a way to defend themselves. A stun gun is a type of electroshock weapon. When fired, it sends out two small electrodes that cling to the target. They then deliver a non-lethal electrical pulse, which disrupts muscle control and briefly incapacitates the person.
Inside the device, Ohmcraft precision surface-mount resistors measure and control the voltage of that pulse. Because the weapons are small, the parts must be small too. They also need an ultra-low voltage coefficient of resistance, so the output stays precise. According to Ohmcraft, these traits matter for the safety of the person who is shocked as well as the person holding the weapon.
Eric Van Wormer, vice president of the Ohmcraft division, said the company’s high-precision resistors have long been used in electrical weapons for law enforcement, the military and personal defense. He noted that stun guns often come out in tense moments, when proper operation can be a matter of life or death. For that reason, he said, the resistors are critical to reliable performance.
The release also pointed to research on injuries. A 2011 review by the U.S. Department of Justice found that 99.7 percent of people shocked by these weapons suffered no injuries or only minor ones. The same research showed that injuries to suspects fell by nearly 60 percent when CEWs were used.
A 2009 study by the Police Executive Research Forum looked at the other side of the encounter. It found that injuries to officers dropped by 76 percent when a stun gun was used. The Justice Department work, by contrast, was published by the National Institute of Justice under the title Police Use of Force, Tasers and Other Less-Lethal Weapons.