Grounding Conductor

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garbo said:
Stopped using all conduits to supply the ground to a device over 45 years ago. While in most cases it's acceptable never 100% reliable. Saw way too many EMT fittings pull apart, steel rigid conduit rust thru etc. Nothing safer then a copper ground conductor same side as the wires feeding 15 & 20 amp receptacles. Was taught that the ground conductor is the most important wire and that it should be the first conductor connected & last to be removed.
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And that's the other thing. It seems like the importance of the EGC is over-emphasized IMO. Almost everyone is obsessed with it. So what if there is an occasional less than perfect fault clearing path? What are the chances that a fault will even happen, plus the chance that it won't clear, plus the chance that person or property will damaged? The obsession with grounding makes people not focus on other equally or even more important aspects of the electrical system, IMO.
 
electrofelon said:
No not mine, others'
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For sure.

I'm just saying I've seen a lot of conduit come apart, and I don't know that it is necessarily the fault of the installer. Since I don't know for sure, I also don't know if I could trust that my own conduit will stay together over the long haul.

But I know I can trust my wire nut connections to outlive me. So if I'm choosing which method to use, I'm going to choose the one that I know.
 
Eddie702 said:
Common sense should prevail. If the emt is strapped good its a non issue weather to pull a ground or not, personally I always do and new jobs I see in my area in the last 20 years always have a ground

On a roof on blocks its going to get stepped on, bent, tripped over etc. Die cast fittings especially don't take a lot of abuse.

I think you have to pull a ground there
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Or run rigid, since it would be considered as subject to damage.
 
We had a customer that had an employee severely shocked from a piece of malfunctioning equipment. The first thing the lawyers asked “was a ground pulled?”, and yes it was. The equipment maintenance company did not get off that easy. The ground prong was missing from the cord, and the foot pedal was shorting to the equipment case, energizing the equipment.
 
hillbilly1 said:
We had a customer that had an employee severely shocked from a piece of malfunctioning equipment. The first thing the lawyers asked “was a ground pulled?”, and yes it was. The equipment maintenance company did not get off that easy. The ground prong was missing from the cord, and the foot pedal was shorting to the equipment case, energizing the equipment.
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“Was a ground pulled?” is a meaningless, ambiguous question. The defense attorney would not allow their client to answer such a question.
 
electrofelon said:
And that's the other thing. It seems like the importance of the EGC is over-emphasized IMO. Almost everyone is obsessed with it. So what if there is an occasional less than perfect fault clearing path? What are the chances that a fault will even happen, plus the chance that it won't clear, plus the chance that person or property will damaged? The obsession with grounding makes people not focus on other equally or even more important aspects of the electrical system, IMO.
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If we could assure the EGC were always going to be sufficient we wouldn't have much need for GFCI's.

Nearly all the GFCI rules were added because of EGC failure incidents, until more recently anyway then it sort of became "because we can".

But notice the majority of the GFCI requirements involve a cord and plug connection where that is often the main location for a potential EGC failure.
 
electrofelon said:
Also seems like an oddly specific question for a lawyer to ask. Was he a former electrician or something?
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They use forensic investigators. We had an employee involved in an accident, his lawyer’s hired a forensic investigator to prove the accident was not his fault, but the customers. (It was actually a combination of both) the lawyer was able to squeeze a chunk of change out of the customer to settle out of court. He was able to convince them the accident was caused by a manager rushing into the electrical room knocking over the employee. The evidence did not point that way, but pointed toward the employee having a stroke. But I didn’t have a dog in that fight, so I let the lawyers and insurance companies fight it out.
 
electrofelon said:
Also seems like an oddly specific question for a lawyer to ask. Was he a former electrician or something?
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One of my best friends is an E.E. and now works as a professional witness. I have worked with him on a few jobs and discussed many others with him.

So, yes, lawyers do engage the services of professionals to know what questions to ask, and how to ask them.
 
LarryFine said:
One of my best friends is an E.E. and now works as a professional witness. I have worked with him on a few jobs and discussed many others with him.

So, yes, lawyers do engage the services of professionals to know what questions to ask, and how to ask them.
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A lawyer that takes on a number of certain industry related cases also becomes more familiar with things that go along with that industry. Medical malpractice cases may greatly outnumber electrical trade relatged cases so you may see more lawyers that are more familiar with medical terms, procedures, etc. but even those lawyers will probably have talks with a medical professional(s) to make sure they are not missing something related to a case.
 
zbang said:
IIRC there's a whole chapter in Soares about using conduit/tubing as the EGC with tests and numbers. Can't reach my copy right now to cite further.

Any discussion of effective fault current paths should include Soares (https://www.iaei.org/store/ListProducts.aspx?catid=785671), perfectly good older editions can be had for a song.
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Apparently software exists as well>>>(go to 27 minutes or so)


~RJ~
 
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