Grounding for KU Dish

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an electrical circuit ground can NOT be used to ground your dishes or wiring.....if you dish was ever struck by lightning that ground would burn your house down....

If the electrical did his job correctly and did the installation per code then there shouldn't be any problem with grounding to the panel box, if he didn't that would be then a big problem. Which he should have checked out to make sure code was followed. The electrical circuit ground is the same ground as earth ground and is connected from the neutral bus to ground. SEE FIG 1.of attached file.
If everything was done correctly then he wouldn't burn his house down, unless the lighting hit the house directly.

http://www.homeinspector.org/resources/journals/Intro-Electrical-Grounding.pdf

Grounding Satellite Dish and Lead-In Cables
 
Question!! Been searching for wire to buy! I can get a 100 ft roll of 4 gauge stranded insulated wire for $50.Would stranded be good enough?

You should be sure to read this article about grounding before starting or talk with your electrician about it.. Just remember grounding is like asking what the weather is going to be. Your going to get at least as many answers as the number of people you ask. How many of the answers are even close to being partly right, depends on the technical training of those asked.
Also if you do decide to run wire and you have to have bends, make them gradual and wide and keep your conductor away from other metal objects and keep in mind that lightning doesn't like to make turns and will always take the path of lower resistance.

Grounding Satellite Dish and Lead-In Cables
 
If the electrical did his job correctly and did the installation per code then there shouldn't be any problem with grounding to the panel box, if he didn't that would be then a big problem. Which he should have checked out to make sure code was followed. The electrical circuit ground is the same ground as earth ground and is connected from the neutral bus to ground. SEE FIG 1.of attached file.
If everything was done correctly then he wouldn't burn his house down, unless the lighting hit the house directly.

http://www.homeinspector.org/resources/journals/Intro-Electrical-Grounding.pdf

Grounding Satellite Dish and Lead-In Cables
Oh Crap!! Did i just throw $50 away:mad:.I guess just to play it safe i will route this 4 gauge wire i just bought along the bottom of the house foundation from the main house ground to the grounds coming off my roof installations and deck dish set up.Updated!!! Thanks sergei! The only sharp turn will be as im turning the corner of the foundation to the main house ground! At that point if a eletric surge from a near hit was to get off the path it would be the ground at that corner.
 
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If the electrical did his job correctly and did the installation per code then there shouldn't be any problem with grounding to the panel box,

Yes there would be a problem, grounding your dish or cables to an exsisting electrical circuit ground wire, or the panel itself is AGAINST CODE!!

The ground must go directly to the grounding point of the homes electrical service, this does NOT mean the electrical panel, this means the point where the electrical panel is grounded,

If lightning hit the dish you don't want to direct the strike INTO the electrical panel, you want to direct it AWAY from the electrical panel,
 
Mikey11 said:
Yes there would be a problem, grounding your dish or cables to an exsisting electrical circuit ground wire, or the panel itself is AGAINST CODE!!

Sorry, I must point out that this statement is in error. While it isn't necessarily the best choice for grounding, it isn't against code.

NEC allows for grounding connection to a metal electrical service panel. A service panel includes meter housings, circuit breakers or sub panels as long as the sub panel is connected to the breaker panel by rigid metal conduit.

Maybe your local code is different, but most local codes mirror the NEC.
 
Sorry, I must point out that this statement is in error. While it isn't necessarily the best choice for grounding, it isn't against code.

NEC allows for grounding connection to a metal electrical service panel. A service panel includes meter housings, circuit breakers or sub panels as long as the sub panel is connected to the breaker panel by rigid metal conduit.

Maybe your local code is different, but most local codes mirror the NEC.

He is asking about grounding his dishes to the ground wire of an electrical circuit, basically a wall outlet plug, not the panel itself
 
Mikey11 said:
He is asking about grounding his dishes to the ground wire of an electrical circuit, basically a wall outlet plug, not the panel itself

I was not responding to the ops question, but rather responding to your last statement that it is against code to ground to the panel.

It is not against code to ground to the panel.
 
He is asking about grounding his dishes to the ground wire of an electrical circuit, basically a wall outlet plug, not the panel itself

Reading his posting again he said an electrical box which could be outlet or I would think they added a new panel, .I would complete agree with you if he is talking about using and outlet. From a previous posting (5-28-2011)I believe the garage is located on the oppose side of the house, so I'm guessing it was an add on and not connect physically to the house to begin with and he does talk about using the outlets. If that's the case then I would guess that they might have also installed a sub panel and he could ground to it. BUT, If he is still talking about just having only outlets then you are correct and it would be against code.And yes he could burn his house down! To give a correct answer we need to know whether he has a sub panel or only outlets to deal with..
 
Oh Crap!! Did i just throw $50 away:mad:.I guess just to play it safe i will route this 4 gauge wire i just bought along the bottom of the house foundation from the main house ground to the grounds coming off my roof installations and deck dish set up.Updated!!! Thanks sergei! The only sharp turn will be as im turning the corner of the foundation to the main house ground! At that point if a eletric surge from a near hit was to get off the path it would be the ground at that corner.

Need to know if your garage only has outlets or did the electrician add a sub panel to the garage, this will make all the different in the world as to what you can do.
 
Reading his posting again he said an electrical box which could be outlet or I would think they added a new panel, .I would complete agree with you if he is talking about using and outlet. From a previous posting (5-28-2011)I believe the garage is located on the oppose side of the house, so I'm guessing it was an add on and not connect physically to the house to begin with and he does talk about using the outlets. If that's the case then I would guess that they might have also installed a sub panel and he could ground to it. BUT, If he is still talking about just having only outlets then you are correct and it would be against code.And yes he could burn his house down! To give a correct answer we need to know whether he has a sub panel or only outlets to deal with..

yes that is a good point and a good question....i just assumed from his wording that he was asking about grounding to a wall plug
 
the garage is attached to the house!Outlets in the garage are snaked threw the firewall joining the house with the garage and all outlets go to one circuit breaker box located in the basement of the house.As you can see from my home pic is my 3ft,6ft and weather station!The weather station and 3 footer are grounded to a grounding rod located on the corner of the garage below the 3 footer.The main house ground shown in the other pic is by the fireplace located at the other end of the house shown in the house pic.The wire comes in late next week so planning and doing the grounding update next weekend,If anyone has any ideas on the best way to do this feel free to put your 2 cents in.! Thanks Stan
 

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the garage is attached to the house!Outlets in the garage are snaked threw the firewall joining the house with the garage and all outlets go to one circuit breaker box located in the basement of the house.As you can see from my home pic is my 3ft,6ft and weather station!The weather station and 3 footer are grounded to a grounding rod located on the corner of the garage below the 3 footer.The main house ground shown in the other pic is by the fireplace located at the other end of the house shown in the house pic.The wire comes in late next week so planning and doing the grounding update next weekend,If anyone has any ideas on the best way to do this feel free to put your 2 cents in.! Thanks Stan

Pictures can be worth a thousand words....first off don't ground to any of your outlets with a ground wire as you garage is attached and like you wrote they go back to the main panel.. I would take the new wire your getting and make sure all your equipment is connected to a ground rod and then make sure that all the rods are bonded to each other and to the main rod where your power comes in. And you can connect a wire from any grounding blocks your using to the ground wire.
 
yes that is a good point and a good question....i just assumed from his wording that he was asking about grounding to a wall plug

And I thought he had a detached garage and it was build away from the main part of the house, maybe I've seen to many HGTV shows. Just glad he post some pictures. I'm just glad I remembered there being another thread on this, because in that posting he did mention using the outlets, but for whatever reason I missed reading it.
Good thing you questioned what was being posted.
 
Thanks again! Never seen a close lightning strike in my lifetime but also dont want to bet that i will never see one,Around 8 years ago when a big colonial down the road was almost done being built got a direct hit from bolt of lightning and blew the roof off of it!thank god no fire after.When they rebuilt the roof they placed 3 lightning rods on that roof to hopefully prevent that happening again.I wondor why lightning rods are not part of the home building code!seems like they were very common in the old days,
 
Thanks again! Never seen a close lightning strike in my lifetime but also dont want to bet that i will never see one,Around 8 years ago when a big colonial down the road was almost done being built got a direct hit from bolt of lightning and blew the roof off of it!thank god no fire after.When they rebuilt the roof they placed 3 lightning rods on that roof to hopefully prevent that happening again.I wondor why lightning rods are not part of the home building code!seems like they were very common in the old days,

Some people around me have them installed and there are still companies that install the rods but I'd guess the main reason is the overall cost and then the look.
 
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