×
INTELLIGENT WORK FORUMS
FOR ENGINEERING PROFESSIONALS

Log In

Come Join Us!

Are you an
Engineering professional?
Join Eng-Tips Forums!
  • Talk With Other Members
  • Be Notified Of Responses
    To Your Posts
  • Keyword Search
  • One-Click Access To Your
    Favorite Forums
  • Automated Signatures
    On Your Posts
  • Best Of All, It's Free!
  • Students Click Here

*Eng-Tips's functionality depends on members receiving e-mail. By joining you are opting in to receive e-mail.

Posting Guidelines

Promoting, selling, recruiting, coursework and thesis posting is forbidden.

Students Click Here

Jobs

Protective Ground required?

Protective Ground required?

Protective Ground required?

(OP)
Hi, just testing the mooload service to make pictures available in the fora. But also asking a question:

Is protective grounding required when a structure is completely passive? In this case (an insulator on display at the Hoover dam) there is nothing connected to the insulator chain or the structure where it hangs. Nonetheless, there is some sort of ground wire attached to the structure and to the handrail surrounding it.

I imagine that there has been some discussions before attaching this wire. The way it was done tells that it was not taken very seriously.

Comments?

http://www.mooload.com/file.php?file=files/1130791649/Protective Ground 1.jpg

Gunnar Englund
www.gke.org

RE: Protective Ground required?

Comment... Your link is kaput!

RE: Protective Ground required?

How far away is this from live HV circuits?  Could be close enough to develop induced voltages.

RE: Protective Ground required?

I thik it's there to ground the handrail.
The insulator string is there for an exhibit I take it ( a close up look for the tourist).
The handrain could be anchored to the concrete with some drop in anchors and not coneectedt to rebar.
The handrail ground itself may be an educational feature the display.
Where are you now, how was/is the trip?

RE: Protective Ground required?

(OP)
Thanks for your comments!

No, I do not think that it is there because of induced voltage. There are several other metallic structures about the same size. And they are not grounded with an extra wire. I think that someone just thought that "this looks electric - better ground it"

And, as you can see, the wire hasn't been laid with great care. The connections are very haphasardly made. It is a "let's get done with it" installation.

Otherwise the trip was a total sucess! Jraef and zdas04 took care about us in San Francisco and Farmington. Had dinner with them and their wives. Nice to meet people that you have come to know and respect via the eng-tips fora. And the south-west is a great part of USA. We have a couple of 1 GB memory sticks filled with pictures. It will take some time to sort all this out.

Gunnar Englund
www.gke.org

RE: Protective Ground required?

There's a real transmission tower in the background. I'm sure that too many people were complaining about the harmless static shocks they were getting off the handrail, and this was the quick and easy fix. The other structures may be grounded to rebar below, be out of reach of the visitors, or be oriented differently to the lines. See http://www.transmission.bpa.gov/NewsEv/pdfs/LivingAndWorking.pdf page 2.

RE: Protective Ground required?

Nice article stevenal!

Red Flag This Post

Please let us know here why this post is inappropriate. Reasons such as off-topic, duplicates, flames, illegal, vulgar, or students posting their homework.

Red Flag Submitted

Thank you for helping keep Eng-Tips Forums free from inappropriate posts.
The Eng-Tips staff will check this out and take appropriate action.

Reply To This Thread

Posting in the Eng-Tips forums is a member-only feature.

Click Here to join Eng-Tips and talk with other members!


Resources