Grounding is an essential part of any electrical installation. It’s there to protect people and property from electrical faults that can occur. Although there are various ways people can prevent electrical faults, proper grounding techniques will reduce the chance of damage and injury caused by electric shocks.
Improper grounding technique in a building is hazardous. It can result in serious injury or even death. There have been incidents where people have been shocked by small items, such as garage door openers or power tools because they were improperly grounded. This article will go over some basic safety tips to enhance your knowledge of safely working on electrical equipment around the house by using proper grounding techniques.
1) Make Sure The Wires Are The Correct Color
Electrical equipment that’s properly grounded have three wires: a green wire, a bare wire and a “pigtail” (or “ring”) wire. The green wire, which is the grounding wire, connects your electrical equipment to the earth so that any fault current will run through this wire instead of you or your property.
The bare wire is for ungrounded equipment like motors. Suppose there’s an internal fault in the motor windings. In that case, ground fault protection ensures that it won’t be completed through the metal housing of the motor – some of it will go back to your circuit breaker or fuse via the grounding electrode system where it belongs.
2) Add a ground wire
If only two wires are coming into a panel from an appliance, you’ll need to add a green wire to complete the ground connection for safety. Some older buildings might only have two cables entering panelboards because they don’t have a grounding wire. In this case, the equipment is not grounded, and it should be labelled “ungrounded,” with a warning sign or notice near it to indicate that it’s not safe.
3) Check The Mounting Strap
The mounting strap connecting the enclosure of an electrical device to its circuit breaker or fuse must be securely grounded – usually utilizing a green screw attached directly to the metal tab on the back of the electrical device. Some panels have built-in junction boxes in which you can terminate your grounding straps, so they don’t touch each other or any ungrounded parts of your panelboard.
4) Make Sure New Systems Are Safe
When a new circuit is installed, it must be grounded. A professional electrician will install an equipment grounding conductor (EGC), a bare copper wire connected to the neutral bus bar in your panelboard, to run alongside the circuit conductors. This connection ensures that any fault current that runs through the power supply line also travels directly into the earth grounding system.
5) Check For Any Bare Wires
It’s important to make sure that no bare wire is exposed anywhere on an appliance’s enclosure because this could provide a dangerous shock path if the wiring inside were to fail.
6) Get A Professional to Check
If you’re not sure whether or not your electrical equipment is properly grounded, have it checked out by a qualified electrician. A qualified electrician will install a grounding electrode system for you if your equipment isn’t already grounded.
7) Leave Neutral Conductors In Place
Never remove or disconnect neutral conductors from a properly grounded circuit or take off ground connections while the power is switched on. Doing so might introduce stray voltages into the chassis of your electrical equipment, which could cause dangerous shocks even when everything seems to be turned off.
8) Never Try Fix Wiring While It’s Live
Always turn off electrical power at the main breaker switch before inspecting or working on any ungrounded parts of your system. This includes checking for shorts in switches and receptacles or servicing light fixtures. Otherwise, you risk receiving an electrical shock that could result in fatalities.
9) Be Cautious When Switching power Back On
If you’re working on an electrical system that isn’t grounded, use extreme caution to ensure that you don’t receive a shock when the power is turned back on. Even if it’s obvious that everything is “dead,” there may be residual voltage hiding somewhere in the circuit, known as stray voltage, which could surprise you with its deadly bite after being re-energized.
Conclusion
Grounding is not a substitute for using fuses or circuit breakers to protect equipment. However, it does provide an essential backup in case something goes wrong with the overcurrent protection devices. Your best defense is to make sure your electrical equipment is properly grounded for safety.
