Conducted grounding in a private house with your own hands will not only help to avoid danger, but also save your budget. After all, an electric current can cause irreparable damage to health and human life. In an emergency, even touching a regular washing machine or microwave oven can lead to tragic consequences. If a zero phase break occurs, the electrical equipment housing becomes dangerous, and the ground loop acts as a phase through which the electric current goes into the ground.
- Grounding Circuit - Requirements for Conductors
- How to Make Grounding - Installation of
- Circuit Connecting the Electrical Board - The Final Stage of Grounding
- How to Check Grounding
Grounding is a necessary measure for any building, whether it is a private building, a multi-unit or a summer residence. In order to avoid short circuits, as well as for the safe operation of any electrical devices, grounding is simply necessary. How to make grounding? Voltage 220 volts and 380 volts require a different approach and different actions, in fact, they are two different networks. At a voltage of 220 V, it is possible to conduct a standard zeroing without arranging the circuit, but for the second variant( 380 V) the grounding circuit is required.
In any case, if you are installing a new wiring or trying to reanimate the old one, the grounding installation must be made.
Installing the circuit, photo:
Grounding circuit - requirements for conductors
Let us understand what a grounding circuit is: in fact, they are deep vertical earthing, interconnected horizontal. A grounding conductor is attached to this design, the main function of which is to connect the circuit and the electrical panel. According to the rules of electrical installations( edition No. 7), for steel conductors it is recommended to use a steel angle( 50 × 50 × 5 mm - ideal), for horizontal conductors - a metal strip( with a rectangular cross section, 40 × 4 mm in size).The ground conductor must be made of a round steel bar with a cross section of 8 or 10 mm².The exact parameters of the grounding elements are described in more detail by the rules for electrical installations( PUE) - Section 1.7
When describing metal elements, the idea of using fittings is suggested - it is absolutely impossible to do this! Reinforcing rods have a surface hardened layer - this factor violates the uniform passage of electric current over the cross section. Also, this material is subject to oxidative, corrosive processes.
Materials for horizontal and vertical elements, photo:
How to make grounding - installation of the circuit
First we make the contour: for this, close to the house( not exceeding 1 m from the basement) mark the isosceles on the ground. Then along the borders of the resulting triangle by a swarm of a trench, a depth of 1 m will suffice. The trench width should be such that it is convenient for you to carry out welding work( 0.5-0.8 m).Initially, horizontal earthing switches are placed along the perimeter of the triangle, after which vertical corners are driven in - they should be buried to a considerable depth - 2 or 3 meters. This is easy to do with a sledgehammer, for the convenience of the process, the angle itself is better to sharpen at the end.
Now install the ground loop. The requirements are as follows: the edges of the vertical earthing should protrude 25 cm from the place of burial. To close the circuit, we weld the horizontal to the grounding vertical. The connection of parts must be made exclusively using a welding machine and nothing else. After that, we connect the circuit to the electrical panel: take a steel wire( section 10 mm), weld it to the circuit, put it in a trench towards the shield, weld the M6 (or M8) bolt to the end of the wire - it is necessary to secure the wire. If you do not have a steel wire, then, as a grounding element, a steel strip can be used( the same one that was used to make horizontal earthing switches).
Ground loop, photo:
According to practical experience, the steel strip is more suitable for grounding than wire, but it is rather difficult to bend it in the required places of the trench. Do not be lazy to process welding places with special anti-corrosion agents, the main thing is that you should never use ordinary paint instead! Metal parts must be extremely tightly in contact with the ground, and the layer of paint prevents contact, creates resistance. After all the manipulations performed, fill the trenches with earth, in this process the arrangement of the contour can be considered complete. All the above steps are also applied when installing lightning protection - the process is the same.
Welding circuit parts, photo:
We should also mention the already prepared prefabricated grounding sets( for example, ZANDZ, KZTS-5, KZM-3, KZM-10, KZM-20), which are sold in the departments of electrical equipment. Such a grounding kit already has all the necessary parts for the arrangement of the system: copper-clad pins, guide head, handpiece, clips, brass couplings for connection, as well as a special anti-corrosion agent. This is quite a convenient solution, as with the purchase of this kit you will receive all the necessary elements for conducting high-quality grounding.
содерж to content ↑Connecting the switchboard - the final stage of the grounding
This process should be carried out by a qualified technician or at least a person who has previously repeatedly dealt with such work. Beginners familiar with the installation of grounding by hearsay or “having penetrated” the Internet about the stages of the process — even if they have thoroughly studied the theoretical part — cannot perform these actions. This case should be taken very seriously, because any wrong step is a threat to your life, health.
Near the place where the contour comes out of the trench, you need to install a junction box on the wall of the house. Inside this box is mounting tires with two mounts for bolts. The strip of the grounding circuit is connected to one mount, to the other you need to connect a copper cable, its cross section must be greater than 10 mm².It is important that the cross section of this cable is not smaller than the cross section of the lead wire. Instead of bolting, you can use a welding machine to connect these parts. After that, the copper cable must be laid to the electrical distribution panel, then connect it to the ground bus. All ground wires will run from this bus. The main condition of this process is the requirement of the integrity of the ground cable at all stages of the installation - it must be solid, not have gaps. Grounding check, measurement of its resistance is carried out at the last stage of the whole process.
The direction of the strip to the house, photo:
In private homes there may be different-phase power supply networks, so the grounding of 220V and 380V must be divided. However, it should be noted that they can be directed to one circuit. Sometimes, in the appropriate forums, you can see comments about the fact that for the 220V network it is not necessary to equip the grounding loop, you can only make zeroing. In fact, the way it is, but still the presence of the circuit will not be superfluous for the power supply of 220V.
If you yourself conduct the grounding 380, then the presence of the circuit is a prerequisite. Power transmission 380V is very demanding on the quality of the grounding circuit.
содерж to contents ↑How to check the grounding
Inspection is carried out after all installation work. For this, there are special devices( for example, Extex GRT300, TH200, EP183M), the process of checking the grounding is the same. Pre-bury two pins( the depth must be at least 50 cm), clean the area on the tire. Then, according to the instructions attached to the device, the wires of the corresponding color must be connected to the ground bus and to the pins. Measurements are taken as instructed by the instrument. According to PUE, the resistance indicator for the 220V mains should not exceed four ohms. Before deepening the pins, make sure that there are no underground utilities at this point.
The phase in the socket can be checked with a special tester, it should be only in one of the holes in the socket. When checking the grounding contact, the tester indicator light should not be on, if it is on, it means that it is necessary to check the correctness of the connection or to detect possible damage. When opening the outlet( of course, the electricity must be disconnected), you must detect the connected three wiring, if there are two, and there is a jumper between the terminals( zero-ground) - this is an indication that the grounding is done, but not grounding. If everything is done correctly, all three wires are in place, then the outlet closes, electricity is turned on, the voltage phase-zero, phase-ground, zero-ground is checked with a multimeter. If there is no voltage at phase-zero, then this may indicate a break of the neutral wire, if there is no voltage at phase-to-ground, then this means that there is no grounding. If at the phase-zero and phase-earth relationship there is voltage, but at zero-earth it is not there, then, apparently, this indicates a zeroing.
If you do not have the appropriate measuring instruments on hand, but you need to check the grounding, you can use the old proven method - a lamp with a cartridge and two wires. The ends of the wires must be cleaned and inserted into the outlet, while the light bulb should be on. Next, remove one of the wiring and touch it to the grounding antenna, if the lamp does not light up during these actions, then check the other wiring in the same way. If a protective shutdown device( RCD) is activated, this is an indicator of the presence of grounding. If there is no protection, but there is a ground-phase connection, the light will also light up, but its luminescence will be much brighter than when the phase-zero is connected.
Protective grounding with your own hands made will protect you from possible electric shock, and your household appliances from breakage. Today we no longer think of our life without a variety of electrical appliances that facilitate our lives. Electricity is a great help to us, but it is deadly if you don’t know how to handle it properly. The organization of proper grounding is the most important stage when installing the wiring of any dwelling. How to make the grounding in a private house properly, they know qualified electricians, but if you undertake this business with your own hands, it will be better if there is an experienced person next to you.
