Grounding Rods??
 

Where's the best place to purchase a grounding rod?
Any secrets to installing it?
Thanks all.
Lenny

Grounding Rods??
 

"Lenny" wrote in message
. ..
Where's the best place to purchase a grounding rod?
Any secrets to installing it?
Thanks all.
Lenny

I've used ones purchased at the Home Depot with
success. If you don't have a sledge hammer, it can
get pretty darn tedious hammering it into clay (like
I've got locally). An electrician friend had the hammer
end welded to two sections of pipe, so that all he
had to do was fit the pipe over the ground rod and
basically let gravity do the work for him as needed.

--Mike L.

Grounding Rods??
 

The Bell South woman next door to me bought a copper grounding rod at a
Home Depot store.I think the rod is about eight feet long and it has a
pointed end on one end of the rod to make it easier to drive it into the
ground.I got my sledge hammer and she and I took turns driving that rod
into the ground.We have some clay in our soil too.Durn clay,when it gets
wet,it expands and when it gets dry,it shrinks.These old houses in my
neighborhood shift around like a boat on the water.I can stand in my
front yard and line up the front of the houses on my side of the street
and it is easy to see the houses have long since been out of plumb.
cuhulin

Grounding Rods??
 

Lenny wrote:
Where's the best place to purchase a grounding rod?
Any secrets to installing it?
Thanks all.
Lenny

installing it?

If you are lucky enough to own (or have a friend that owns) a hammer
drill with a big enough chuck (5/8?) to take the ground rod, it will
make *very* short work of the job...

Grounding Rods??
 

"Carter, K8VT" wrote:

Lenny wrote:
Where's the best place to purchase a grounding rod?
Any secrets to installing it?
Thanks all.
Lenny

installing it?

If you are lucky enough to own (or have a friend that owns) a hammer
drill with a big enough chuck (5/8?) to take the ground rod, it will
make *very* short work of the job...

A pipe threaded and capped at one end fitted over the rod works great.
Works great when the city puts in new signs.

Grounding Rods??
 

On Wed, 4 Jan 2006 11:25:46 -0500, "Lenny"
wrote:

Where's the best place to purchase a grounding rod?
Any secrets to installing it?
Thanks all.
Lenny


Let the hose dribble ove the place where the rod penetrates the earth
so that water fills the hole along side the rod. Take your time.

Grounding Rods??
 

On Wed, 4 Jan 2006 11:25:46 -0500, "Lenny"
wrote:

Where's the best place to purchase a grounding rod?
Any secrets to installing it?
Thanks all.
Lenny


Home Depot and Lowe's Home Improvement both sell 8 foot copper plated
rods of good quality. Or any electrical supply store sellsl them.
Radio Shack has them, but the one I bought there rusted easily.

Driving them in the ground is another matter. I have an official
ground rod driver that I got from Glen Martin, the tower people. It's
a piece of pipe that fits over the rod, and has handles on each side
so the pipe can be pounded on the rod, driving it down. Similar
devices for driving metal fence posts into the ground are available
wherever fencing supplies are sold.

Or, you can just pound the thing in with a hammer, and a little help
from the garden hose.

I have solid rock about one foot down -- I ended up just putting down
a short piece of copper pipe, then attaching two buried, 70-foot wires
to the pipe. If you can't go down, go horizontal.

bob
k5qwg

Driven Ground Rods - Three Common Ways
 

Bob [K5QWG],

Driven Ground Rods - Three Common Ways :
http://www.sonoma-county.org/prmd/do...Electrodes.gif


* Straight Down {Vertical} at 8 Feet

* 45 Degree Angle {Sloper} 8 Feet

* Laying Flat {Horizontal} 'under' the Surface
of the Ground 2 1/2 Feet or more and 8 Feet long.

hope this helps - iane ~ RHF

Grounding Rods??
 

Lenny wrote:
Where's the best place to purchase a grounding rod?
Any secrets to installing it?
Thanks all.
Lenny


Google for this, there are some interesting sites about installing
ground rods. It took a couple of weekends for me to get 8' into the TX
dirt, drove a little, drank a little, feel down, start over. I stopped
short of where I originally wanted it to go with about 1.5' sticking out
of the ground with a big ass ground wire coming into the house and
installed on a "ground plane" in the room.

Grounding Rods??
 

You could buy an inexpensive plastic water pipe adapter (less than a
dollar)that has threads on one end of the adapter and a long (I think
they are sold in lenghts about ten feet long) rigid plastic water pipe
at a Home Depot store (or similar stores) and see if a plumbing shop
will glue the adapter onto the pipe for you.Screw the adapter onto a
water hose and turn on the water.That will make it easy to "predrill" a
hole in the ground for the metal grounding rod.Some plumbers use a
similar technique to "predrill" holes underneath sidewalks so they can
run wiring or metal pipes/tubing under sidewalks.Hey,if ya strike
oil,dont forget about me.
cuhulin