Grounding off-grid inverter via on-grid outlet ground

[Mgamerz]

I just got an Eg4 6000XP, which is going to sit right next my house's main electrical panel in my garage. It's a real mess in that panel, and I'm not too comfortable working in it due to the previous homeowner choices. When I'm in a better financial position in a few months I'm going to have a professional electrician help me sort it out.

I did not think far enough ahead to consider how I am going to ground the inverter unit itself without going though the existing grid panel. My solar panels are grounded via the Brightmount rack they sit on, which I grounded to rods placed near them in the opposite side of my house.

Am I able to ground my 6000XP via an existing on-grid electrical socket's ground? This would be achieved by taking an extension cord, replacing the plug (not connecting hot or neutral), and then unsheathing the other end and using the ground wire. This would be so it stays snugly in the socket. My inverter will be feeding a critical loads panel, but in the short term it will just be a single outlet I'm going to add right below the inverter.

This would not for grid input to the inverter(it wouldn't work anyways). The ground for my garage is directly on the other side of an exterior wall, but it seems to be cabled behind my siding and tucked behind a concrete walkway, so I don't really have a way to get to it.

This would only be temporary for a few months until I replace my grid panel with something more manageable than the spagetti monster it currently is.

 

[hwy17]

There's more to grounding than just attaching stuff to a ground.

We'd need a circuit diagram of what you're planning to do. What loads you're gonna put on it.

Where is the ground neutral bond gonna reside for those loads is the question.

 

[Mgamerz]

Sorry for late reply, been busy.

I talked with my electrician, who helped me connect the 6000XP and my new subpanel to the ground bar of the grid panel in my garage (what spaghetti that panel is). That grounds to a rod next to my meter, which has another rod placed 8 feet away.

Since your post, I did a lot of research into grounding - and bonding - and right now the ground-neutral bond is being handled by the 6000XP, as I am not using grid-pass through at all.

The original topic of this thread was if I could just use the ground pin on an outlet as a source for ground in the inverter - my electrician said that technically yes, that could be done, but it's not really a good idea, as the wire size for it may not be big enough (he suggested #6), and it's very hackjob. Don't mess with electricity. So for now I have the grounding situation solved.