New answers tagged grounding
1
Doesn't work at all.
A piece of metal embedded in the earth is only good for returning natural electricity sources - lightning and ESD. This works because those sources are extremely high voltage, so they are able to push through the high resistance dirt.
If you have an electrical fault, you need to return human-generated electricity. For that you need a ...
0
Broadly speaking there are two main types of earthing system (there are also some others that are only used in specialised situations).
In a TN system the customer's earth is connected to the Neutral and the whole system is connected to the generl , this provides a low-impedance path for ground faults. TN systems can be divided into three subtypes, in a TN-S ...
1
The risks are that you won't have a proper ground and won't have the protection a ground provides. The fact that the angle iron is old and rusted proves my point. Normal ground rods are made of copper, galvanized steel and numerous other materials base on their ability to conduct and not corrode. The rust will prevent you from getting a good connection. even ...
4
Yes,THHN is legit for pigtails, solid is a sure bet... or stranded, if you have the chops to attach it to a screw.
answered Aug 11 at 17:54
Harper - Reinstate Monica
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19
Green wire is perfectly legit. If you are really lazy or in a hurry you can even get pre-cut pre-stripped green grounding pigtails ready to go.
Ground is the only thing it can be used for, but "green or bare" is fine for ground nearly everywhere (I think there are some hot tub/pool specific cases where green is required and bare is not OK, but I ...
4
You can use that lug for the neutral from the generator. I would not use it for ground. Go to a neutral or ground bar for that.
It appears all the bars in this panel are configured as neutral bars. There are ~56 neutral lugs, and 40 spaces, so barely enough neutrals. If you needed to run this panel as a sub, you would need accessory ground bars.
On a ...
answered Aug 2 at 16:06
Harper - Reinstate Monica
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7
This is wired as a main panel (not a sub-panel), so they are effectively the same. Best practice is to wire grounds and neutrals separated in case this panel ever needs to become a sub-panel, but what you've got here now is a typical main panel where the neutrals and grounds are intermixed.
4
In a main panel with bond, there is no (functional) difference.
Many workers will still separate the functions, and "you tell" based on "what's in this bar? - White or Green/bare?" Also, Neutrals are one wire per hole, while grounds in most bars are allowed to be multiple wires per hole (check the label on the box for details and torques -...
7
Someone was lazy and used the backstabs which are notorious for working loose over time. That would be your issue.
Use a screwdriver to take out the blacks stabbed in the back and instead connect those on the screws. That should fix your issue.
The ground wire should be connected only to a green screw or the connection marked as ground if present. But it ...
5
Do not connect the ground wire to the side screws. These are just the same connections as the back-stabs that the wires are pushed into.
There should be a green screw, probably on the top or bottom of the switch. That is the ground connection. If there isn't one, you should probably replace the switch.
Also, you should avoid using the back-stabs in the first ...
1
The NEC allows connecting to a ground from another circuit if that circuit originates in the same panel.
If they do originate in different panels or a subpanel the Code also allows connecting to any point on the grounding electrode system, the grounding electrode conductor, the ground bar in the panel where the circuit originates, or the grounded conductor ...
-1
"Special" switches, including motion sensors, dimmers, smart switches, timers, etc. often need power even when the lights (or other controlled items) are off. There are 4 ways they can get this power:
Battery
This is simplest - no issue of "what wires are available" - but generally least desirable because of the need to periodically ...
answered Jul 26 at 19:06
manassehkatz-Moving 2 Codidact
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6
I'll bet what you heard about isolating was about the grounded wire, which is what we normally refer to as the neutral wire. See:
Grounded vs. Grounding
for a more complete explanation.
Neutral wires indeed need to be kept separate for different circuits in the same box. The exception, sort of, is an MWBC where one neutral actually serves two different hots ...
answered Jul 23 at 23:55
manassehkatz-Moving 2 Codidact
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1
The bare twisted wires in the metal box are your ground wires , with metal boxes they should be connected to the box and if your new lights have a green ground or bare copper connect that to the bare wires in the box also. The black is the hot and white neutral with only 3 in there and wired to code.
1
You need to bond the rebar (note the difference!)
The issue at hand here isn't that the rebar is way out at some voltage far above the "earth potential", whatever that means, but that that the slab and rebar can have a potential on it that's different from the potential of some other nearby conductive object (such as some part of the spa/hot tub). ...
6
The inspector should have red-flagged 2 or more circuits to the same outbuilding. That's not allowed.
There should be a subpanel alright, but it needs to be on the garage, and then the mandatory grounding rods are a straightforward matter.
The grounding rods are no substitute for a ground wire; they do different jobs.
Since Code does not allow multiple ...
answered Jul 18 at 16:11
Harper - Reinstate Monica
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3
Dang. Why on Gods Green Earth did your "electrician" suggest this? We get a lot of "sub-panel" questions here that are quite similar, but this one is new to me.
Why not simply place the sub-panel in the garage? Run a decent feed to it, oversize it (I'd get snipped by one of the big-3 here if I didn't mention that! LOL) It would be much ...
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