[RFI] Arc-fault breakers

[Jim Brown]

On 2/22/2020 10:14 AM, Kenneth G. Gordon wrote:
> Eventually, I found that the original incompetent people who had added some circuts to the
> OLD panel, had run a #8 ground wire from the panel, exactly 33' long (1/4 wave on 40) clear
> around the basement to a clamp.....on a PLASTIC cold water pipe!!!

The same fools must have wired the home I bought in W6 14 years ago! 
Wiring and grounding was a train wreck, including the same mistake you 
found -- the only ground for power entry was a #10 bare copper going to 
a hose outlet, which was fed by PVC pipe. The only other ground was a 
driven rod in an outbuilding (now my shack) connected to a panel in that 
building by a bare #10 that went up through an attic, across the 
building, then down to the rod, carefully run next to molding for 
windows and wall framing. The result was that ground (that rod in the 
outbuilding) for power entry was about 150 ft from power entry.

That outbuilding included washer and dryer in a half-kitchen, and 120V 
outlets in the kitchen were wired from phase (hot) and ground (the green 
wire), not neutral as required by law.
> 
> I then drove three 8' copper-clad steel ground rods, 8" apart, outside the house where the
> panel was located, tied them all together, shortened up the #8 ground wire to about 10 feet,
> and clamped it securely to those ground rods.

Great work. I did something similar at the power entry, and installed a 
half-perimeter ground around building that houses the shack.

73, Jim K9YC