Server room grounding bar

[magictolight.com]

You guys ever size a grounding bar for a small server room. Is there a code requirement for size. This room will be fed from individual branch circuits from a breaker panel room.

 

[ron]

Dedicated ground bar is only required by contract, not NEC.
Get requirements from owner or Engineer.

 

[brian john]

As specified by the engineer, I have seen them from 1/4"X1"X4" to 1/2"X36"X36". Take your pick, not sure the reasoning behind the 1/2"X36"X36" as there were only 4 conductors terminated on the GB.

 

[boboelectric]

Telephone equipment rooms require those bonding bars.

 

[Mr. Bill]

... not sure the reasoning behind the 1/2"X36"X36" as there were only 4 conductors terminated on the GB.

Yeah, that's right up there with IT demanding (2) 4" sleeves and then only installing one fiber thru it. Just amazed at the waste in IT infrastructure and the lack of push back on their demands.

 

[SparknMike]

The extra room is usually an allowance for growth. Where there is one rack today there may be ten racks in the future. Where there is one fiber line today there may be hundreds in the future.

Given the difficulty and increased expenses for running large conduits later, people who plan ahead for such things are making themselves the hereos of the future.

I am involved in one such project where they have a large number of 4" conduits that are mostly holding a few fiber lines. One aspect of the project is estimated to save the client over a million dollars by doubling the number of cables and fiber lines going through these conduits. This is simply a large scale example of having plenty of room to grow using the technology infrastructure rather than replacing a large number of point-to-point cables in small conduits.

Their current installation has plenty of room for expansion; HVAC, branch circuits, and grounding are already sized for several times the amount of installed equipment.

If this happens a few more times over the years they will have saved enough money for someone to retire.

 

[zbang]

Yabut... it's all relative. Three 4" pipes going into a 10x10' room with maybe 3 or 4 20a curcuits is overbuilding. The 36" sq ground bar is definitely overbuilding. (kinda like a 400a service to an outhouse). If you've got the resources to expand sensible (power/hvac/space), then more pipes might make sense when building. OTOH it you have to double the service in order to expand, adding a couple more pipes into the server room probably ins't your biggest challange.

 

[dbuckley]

It wasn't that long ago that racks needed a couple of KW of power on a couple of circuits, and those of us who overspecified so you could get twice that were, as noted above, heros.

None of us saw 20+KW per rack coming, and today thats commonplace...

 

[skeshesh]

It's all relative but with a bit of engineering intuation and speaking to client/client's maint. & tech. guys it should be easy to size for the future. I enjoyed the lovely poetry by SparknMike but the truth is you're not some sort of champion of savings if you blindly oversize any project with the word "IT" in there; I'd rather size appropriately, which may mean to account for expanding a facility times over or it could be to size conservatively to conserve cost/space/construction time. As far as grounding for the server room there are typical sizes for the bar, the more important issue is placing the runs so that equipment can be moved/added if thats what the client calls for.