Earth grounding

[Traviss224]

The inverters are also grounded - all metal cases - including the PV frames connect together to ground.

Grounded as in earth grounded

 

[OffGridForGood]

Grounded as in earth grounded

Grounded as in electrically connected to the main building grounding conductors which ultimately tie to the Earth-Ground rods in the soil beside the main panel.

 

[Traviss224]

Listen to this last video starting at 4:10

EG at input, not output. So at my panel box of I was connected to grid, I would need to remove my earth rod. Since I am off-grid he says nothing at all and let it float

 

[Traviss224]

@timselectric can give you the specific code on ground rods, it's something like two within 10' with 4 AWG bare wire (but don't quote me).

But this causes a ground loop, correct?

This causes the area between the two rods to be high resistance? So if you grabbed something, you become least resistant?

 

[robbob2112]

I got punked -- i had my sense of humor extracted years ago and now take everything litterally

Forget the videos.

The right thing to do is to have a single ground rod. To that ground rod you will connect your AC panel, the inverter ground screw, any other equipment ground connections, the metalic conduit the PV wires are in (inside or attached to any dwelling pv wires must be in metal conduit). Also run an EGC (extra grounding wire) from your grounding system to the panels. At the panels you ground the frames of the panels, the racking if it is metal, if it is all on a metal roof that gets grounded too. There can be only one.

Since there is no grid hookup the neutral ground bond is made in the AC panel of your house.

What you never attach to a grounding system is either pole of a battery or DC system, either leg of split-phase or single phase power.

The whole purpose of all of this is so ALL of the metal parts that you might touch are all at the same potential and there is no differential voltage to shock you. Tieing all of that to a ground rod means if you are standing barefoot outside and touch conduit or the ladder you have leaned against the roof you won't get shocked.

By attaching the panels and roof to the ground potential any lightning will travel to that ground rather than through the equipment.

It has nothing to do with anything the guy in the first video says.

For off-grid not being grounded that is to do with vehicles - planes, trains, boats, and automobiles. Any house, shack, shed, pig pen, doghouse, or other thing that is relatively permenant needs a grounding system.

You may not be getting any inspections so nobody is looking over your shoulder, but the best practices of the NEC are written for a reason. The guys that write that are smart guys that get paid to think about and argue about the code.

 

[Traviss224]

Forget the videos.

The right thing to do is to have a single ground rod. To that ground rod you will connect your AC panel, the inverter ground screw, any other equipment ground connections, the metalic conduit the PV wires are in (inside or attached to any dwelling pv wires must be in metal conduit). Also run an EGC (extra grounding wire) from your grounding system to the panels. At the panels you ground the frames of the panels, the racking if it is metal, if it is all on a metal roof that gets grounded too. There can be only one.

Since there is no grid hookup the neutral ground bond is made in the AC panel of your house.

What you never attach to a grounding system is either pole of a battery or DC system, either leg of split-phase or single phase power.

The whole purpose of all of this is so ALL of the metal parts that you might touch are all at the same potential and there is no differential voltage to shock you. Tieing all of that to a ground rod means if you are standing barefoot outside and touch conduit or the ladder you have leaned against the roof you won't get shocked.

By attaching the panels and roof to the ground potential any lightning will travel to that ground rather than through the equipment.

It has nothing to do with anything the guy in the first video says.

For off-grid not being grounded that is to do with vehicles - planes, trains, boats, and automobiles. Any house, shack, shed, pig pen, doghouse, or other thing that is relatively permenant needs a grounding system.

You may not be getting any inspections so nobody is looking over your shoulder, but the best practices of the NEC are written for a reason. The guys that write that are smart guys that get paid to think about and argue about the code.

You already lost me. It's either your way or no way. Sure @Will gets paid to make videos but if he thinks or knows something is unsafe, I don't believe that has anything to do with him getting paid. I do think folks writing these codes, know hardly anything about the codes. Coming from a construction and law enforcement background, most codes, laws, etc are written and come from someone sitting in an office who has never done anything related.

 

[robbob2112]

You already lost me. It's either your way or no way. Sure @Will gets paid to make videos but if he thinks or knows something is unsafe, I don't believe that has anything to do with him getting paid. I do think folks writing these codes, know hardly anything about the codes. Coming from a construction and law enforcement background, most codes, laws, etc are written and come from someone sitting in an office who has never done anything related.

I got punked -- i had my sense of humor extracted years ago and now take everything litterally

I explained the WHY behind everything I said to do.

If you haven't got sense enough to listen to good advice when you ask you are either jerking my chain or we will be reading about you in a bad yahoo article or a darwin award. Try not to electrocute anyone besides yourself.

 

[Will Prowse]

@Will Prowse is his tag

He started by telling people how to wire power in van conversions. He is a good entertainer and generally good at getting the point across to the normal person. It doesn't mean he has code or the reasons behind things memorized. And in many or most of his videos the installs would not pass inspection. He has gotten better over time as he learns more.

I explained the WHY behind everything I said to do.

If you haven't got sense enough to listen to good advice when you ask you are either jerking my chain or we will be reading about you in a bad yahoo article or a darwin award. Try not to electrocute anyone besides yourself.

What have I done that was dangerous?

 

[Will Prowse]

Forget the videos.

The right thing to do is to have a single ground rod. To that ground rod you will connect your AC panel, the inverter ground screw, any other equipment ground connections, the metalic conduit the PV wires are in (inside or attached to any dwelling pv wires must be in metal conduit). Also run an EGC (extra grounding wire) from your grounding system to the panels. At the panels you ground the frames of the panels, the racking if it is metal, if it is all on a metal roof that gets grounded too. There can be only one.

Since there is no grid hookup the neutral ground bond is made in the AC panel of your house.

What you never attach to a grounding system is either pole of a battery or DC system, either leg of split-phase or single phase power.

The whole purpose of all of this is so ALL of the metal parts that you might touch are all at the same potential and there is no differential voltage to shock you. Tieing all of that to a ground rod means if you are standing barefoot outside and touch conduit or the ladder you have leaned against the roof you won't get shocked.

By attaching the panels and roof to the ground potential any lightning will travel to that ground rather than through the equipment.

It has nothing to do with anything the guy in the first video says.

For off-grid not being grounded that is to do with vehicles - planes, trains, boats, and automobiles. Any house, shack, shed, pig pen, doghouse, or other thing that is relatively permenant needs a grounding system.

You may not be getting any inspections so nobody is looking over your shoulder, but the best practices of the NEC are written for a reason. The guys that write that are smart guys that get paid to think about and argue about the code.

My video did not have to do with that at all. It had to do with the creation of ground loops when multiple offgrid inverters are connected in parallel.

 

[Hedges]

How is ac power from the inverter making it's way back to the panels?

IMHO, it is a less desirable inverter design if split-phase system results in AC superimposed on PV input. But a number of these AIO do.

The transformerless GT PV inverters I use would do that if connected to 208V of 120/208Y but not 120/240V split phase as I'm using them. Probably would for 240V Delta.

A bunch of people and their dog (literally) got shocked by PV panels, or by inverter/RV when connected to ground mount panels.

The solution is simply to run a "ground" wire bonding PV panel frames to inverter chassis. And have inverter chasses bonded to a ground rod. My equipment is grid-tie so it uses the ground wire on AC input. For off-grid systems, it is likely a ground rod wired to the N-G bond in loads panel.

The wire is also useful to protect against DC shocks, which can happen due to damage or faults in the PV panels. Some models, since recalled, developed leakage.

So we are earth grounding solar panels that has no power going to them but were not earth grounding your inverter inside the house???? Im not trying to be humorous with this. I'm being serious. I'm fairly new.

Yes, inverter chassis should be earth grounded, and bonded to all gas and water pipes. This ensures no voltage between any metal things you might touch or between them and earth.

 

[robbob2112]

Sorry, I never said anything was dangerous. Besides, when I said to forget the videos it was more to say "here is how to do it" verse saying the info in the videos was bad, well other than the guy saying never ground anything DC because he clearly didn't understand grounding at all.

Many of your videos are mocked up on plywood sheets with exposed wiring not in conduit. Earlier ones didn't have the wire size imprinted into the lugs because of the type crimper used. Everything would be functional and safe for what it is.

Those are the things that come to mind.

By that I mean your mockups are showing the connections and how to make thing work and go together not necessarily show every wire.

Unfortunatly folks like @Traviss224 that I was responding don't understand what you are trying to say and then refuse to listen when they are told the correct way to do things.
I got punked -- i had my sense of humor extracted years ago and now take everything litterally

Which is why I wish sometimes you did show every wire on every video even if you don't talk about them all. In any case I have never gone 'wtf was he thinking' when watching one of yours. A lot of the others put out ridiculous stuff like the first video that was posted.

 

[Traviss224]

Sorry, I never said anything was dangerous.

Many of your videos are mocked up on plywood sheets with exposed wiring not in conduit. Earlier ones didn't have the wire size imprinted into the lugs because of the type crimper used. Everything would be functional and safe for what it is.

Those are the things that come to mind.

By that I mean your mockups are showing the connections and how to make thing work and go together not necessarily show every wire.

Unfortunatly folks like the fella I was responding don't understand what you are trying to say and then refuse to listen when they are told the correct way to do things.

Which is why I wish sometimes you did show every wire on every video even if you don't talk about them all.

I am asking questions and getting responses. I am not refusing to listen. But when you are saying not to worry about paying attention to a video that I am posting I have nothing else to say to you. That is the problem when you do a search and get 100 post containing all of these random questions and you get off the wall responses.

And if NEC code is written like RBC/ CBC, then a lot of the things are bogus. If you build a house on the beach you have to use these special ties now. Billy up the road came up with them and they're now code. Oh they are $10 a piece and you need 100 of them per house. But that house gets swept away by the next hurricane. The 100 year old house is still there. Just bc something is "required" doesn't mean it's the best practice.

 

[robbob2112]

I am asking questions and getting responses. I am not refusing to listen. But when you are saying not to worry about paying attention to a video that I am posting I have nothing else to say to you. That is the problem when you do a search and get 100 post containing all of these random questions and you get off the wall responses.

And if NEC code is written like RBC/ CBC, then a lot of the things are bogus. If you build a house on the beach you have to use these special ties now. Billy up the road came up with them and they're now code. Oh they are $10 a piece and you need 100 of them per house. But that house gets swept away by the next hurricane. The 100 year old house is still there. Just bc something is "required" doesn't mean it's the best practice.

You are welcome to your opinion - have a nice life

 

[Danke]

Which end of the grounding rod do you put the T Class fuse?

 

[Traviss224]

Which end of the grounding rod do you put the T Class fuse?

Neither it goes on the roof next to the muffle bearing on the windmill

 

[OffGridForGood]

Think of the grounding as a means to bring all metal that you could touch in the system to the same electrical potential as the earth, which you can also be touching - directly or indirectly such as touching a faucet.
If the metal for any reason is exposed to a charge potential, you will be safe to touch it, because that charge has an easier path to ground than your body.

 

[robbob2112]

I think I'll be in the airplane if I can find the keys, the portable flightline, and the lightbulb repair kits.