Leave a Comment / BLOG / By mazhar001
People always need to ensure safety first where they live in. Homeowners must ensure that their structures are secure from unforeseen calamities. Lightening or a severe storm might occur at any time. It might be the cause of the mishaps. So, every people should ensure their safety first.
To avoid these accidents people should use ground rods under their buildings. Ground rods help a lot to prevent these types of accidents. It can keep the danger away from your buildings. But there are some limits to put these types of ground rods under the buildings. The establishing framework makes a channel of slightest resistance so that current can securely stream back to the soil. As a result, the dangers of a fire or life-threatening stun from a brief circuit are decreased.
In this article, we will describe about how many ground rods are for 200 amp service. So people can easily understand about their planning to put the ground rods.
What is The Ground Rod
Ground rods are very familiar to all electrical engineers. This is also called a grounding electrode. This is mainly used for keeping safe the building’s owner and their family. This is a kind of metal shaft that is used under the ground because of saving the buildings from uncertain heavy storms or thunderstorms.
These ground rods are installed by professional electrical engineers. By creating a ground feel can ensure the safety most. Ground poles are fabulous electricalconductors, permitting any unsafe vitality to travel to the ground and absent from you and the electrical board.
Simply said the ground rod creates the electrics more and can prevent static electric voltage discharge. It can also prevent lightning, thunderstorms, etc. static discharge. So, this is the most important factor to use this ground rod perfectly. In the next section, we will explain briefly about these ground rods in detail. So, people can easily understand all facts about these ground rods.
People should need two ground rods for 200 amp service. This is enough for supporting the 200 amp service. Sometimes people do not know about the wire. They must need wire for a 200 amp sub panel. People need hot and neutral wires for grounding. The ground wire will be a 6AWG bare copper wire, and the wires will be 250kcmil aluminum.
We put a table with the size of the grounding electrode conductor
125 Amps | #8 AWG | #6 AWG |
150 Amps | #6 AWG | #4 AWG |
200 Amps | #4 AWG | #2 AWG |
What size of the ground wire is needed
The ground wire is also an important part of the ground rod. So, we should also know the size of the ground wire. In the below, people can get the idea of using the ground wire. We put all their sizes.
Rating overcurrent device in the circuit | Copper (AWG) | Aluminum (AWG) |
1000 | 2 / 0 | 4 / 0 |
1200 | 3 / 0 | 250 |
1600 | 4 / 0 | 350 |
2000 | 250 | 400 |
Why is it so important
The ground rod is very essential for us to keep safe ourselves from uncertain upcoming electricity to the ground. The grounding rod works as an electrical conductor. It can prevent your house from the unauthorized or uncertain electricity to the ground.
Usually, there are used electricity panels in every single house. It is mandatory to use these panels. But there is a problem too with this panel. This electric panel can occur the dangerous thing. While thunderstorms have happened then it is lightning so much. In that case, this electric panel attracts that lightning, so it is so dangerous for the house.
So, we badly need a ground rod that time to prevent this lightening. The grounding rod has the super ability to convert the lightning into the static discharge from the roof and ground safely. These grounding rods are intended to stabilize power source voltages and convert them to static discharge to the earth. Unless there's ground blame or a lost unbiased association, the soil ground conductor ought to never carry current in ordinary utilization.So, this is very much important for keeping us safe. We should use the perfect ground rods while building a new house.
What materials are used to make ground rods
In the above, we already mentioned that ground rod is very essential and important things for us. It can keep safe us from many uncertain accidents. So, it should be built with high quality materials. Grounding rods can be made with different kinds of materials.
All of these are not perfect for your home. So, people should need to take suggestions from the electrical expert engineer while installing any new grounding rods for their home. Otherwise, it would not work better. We will describe about some high quality materials which are vastly used for making grounding rods.
Copper: Copper is the most often used material for grounding rods. This copper has the ability to raise the ground rod's level. Mainly a ground rod is made of steel. There is applied copper over this grounding rod properly. It can serve for a long time for these overlapping copper materials.
Stainless Steel: This is a precious material than others. Using stainless steel to overlap or apply onto the ground rod is really expensive than other materials. There are some reasons also to increase its price and value also. Stainless steel is totally corrosion-free.
So it is very important to keep perfect the ground rod under the ground. So, that should not be affected with corrosion early. That's why stainless steel materials are used so more on the grounding rod.
What is the minimum depth for a ground rod
To put in the right place under the ground, there must need enough holes or space. People first must know about the length of any ground rod. Usually, a ground rod can be 8 feet in length. As a result, the hole should be dug vertically and at least eight feet deep into the ground. Otherwise, the ground rod cannot keep in the hole.
So, every people should concern while digging the hole. They should measure perfectly while digging under the ground. The length of grounding rod and pipe cathodes is 250.52 inches according to the 2017 National Electric Code (NEC).
Can I use a rebar as a grounding rod
Sometimes people cannot find any good grounding rod. In most of the rare cases, then they should use other things like pipe, rebar, etc. In rare cases, people can use the rebar as a grounding rod. So, there is no problem.
But they should try to use a grounding rod. If there is a problem with that, that case they can use rebar instead of using grounding rods. If they use grounding rods, then they should be made with high quality materials such as stainless steel or galvanizing steel. This is good for ground rods.
What size neutral is required for a 200 amp service
Neutral should in fixed size for a 200 amp service. Usually, a 200 amp service is #3 / 0 copper. It may shift in any situation, depending on the controls and materials. They can also utilize unbiased on the event to reduce.
Be certain that #6 establishing or #4 aluminum is necessary for a 200 amp advantage. Something else, it'll not work accurately. So try to use the perfect size neutral for 200 amp service.
Can I use 14 gauge ground wires on a 20 amp circuit
This answer should be negative. No, you cannot use 14 gauge ground wires on a 20 amp circuit at all. According to the law NEC 240.4(D)(3) states, 14 gauge is applied for only 15 amp circuit. So, there may happen a problem if you will use 14 gauge ground wires on a 20 amp circuit. You cannot replace these 14 gauges with any 20A breaker. You should not do this at all.
Can you touch a ground rod
Before starting the digging process, you can touch the normal ground rod with your hand. But there might be a problem if you touch the rod while putting it on the ground. You can get shocked as well as some electricjerked. But, you won’t get hurt or serious injuries. Just a little shockhas happened to you.
Final Words
Finally, every people must know about the ground rod because it is used vastly in every single house. So, people will get concerned about this. This ground rod can be kept themselves safe and secure. It can prevent any uncertain accidents and ensure safety most.
So, people should know about all limitations and rules for installing any new grounding rods. In the above, we discussed fully about how many ground rods for 200 amp service. We hope, this article will be very helpful to everyone.