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Dana67Dart said

I got a good shock off of a generator winding while polarizing it. everyone said I was crazy BUT it did happen. it felt like a spark plug hit.

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Of course you did. It's called "inductive kick" and is similar to the shock you get of a lawn mower magneto grounding lead, or the transistor of the Mopar ECU--which is connected to the NEG of the coil primary. What happens is when you have ANY electromagnet type device, such as a relay coil, solenoid, transformer, ignition coil, etc, and you power it--even with say, an analog multimeter with the old 1 1/2V battery for the low ohms scale---the current flow will build a magnetic field, and when you disconnect (flash) the field collapses and develops a spike that you FEEL

This is why modern relays and circuits use a spike diode--because modern solid state switching circuits are prone to failure from the switching spike.

I've --in the old days when I was young, and before I joined the Navy, --gotten a real surprise when checking out old TV tube type power transformers with an ohmeter. "Not thinking" holding the meter leads against the transformer leads with my fingers LOL