Hi there,

There is no way to swap competent cells. Electrocompetent cells are prepared to cope with electrotransformation and chimiocompetent cells are made to be transformed via heat shock. If you run electroporation with chemically competent cells, you will get a very nice electric arcing because of the calcium chloride present in cell sample. And if you run chemical transformation protocol with electrocompetent cells, nothing will happen as permeability of cells depends on current applied (in chemical transformation you don't apply any current...).

Thanks Dominique for your precise explanation.

I wanted an elaborate explanation based on membrane structure, role of chilled glycerol and calcium ions.   

for heat shock transformation, cells are in CaCl2 solution. The high ion concentration of the solution will increase the conductivity during electroporetion and electroporetion will not work (this technique requires low salt concentration solution t"o increase the resistance of the solution)

for electroporation cells are in water. But  Heat shock transformation requires presence of CaCl2.that will adsorb on the membrane of the cell.

Thanks Marie-Pierre for this nice explanation.