Ground is MORE IMPORTANT than you think! EB#57

Comments · 550

• ET

  @eternalhunter5036 · 2 years ago

  FINALLY, this is a topic that surprisingly little people have attempted to explain and in a simple and yet deep well put together way. It's honestly felt like a roadblock for electronics to me, google searches only get you so far. Thanks :)

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• LE

  @LegoTechnicsRule · 2 years ago

  You’re slowly turning into electroboom.

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• ST

  @Stewi1014 · 2 years ago (edited)

  I always make sure to include a few hundred grams of soil inside of every product I design, ensuring a reliable ground connection for the enclosure by shoving a wire into the soil and guaranteeing safety of the device. Proper grounding is very important!<br><br><br><br><br>Sorry, I had to.

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• MA

  @maltekobbe3740 · 2 years ago

  my dad was working for a broadcasting company in germany. they had 3 metel towers for sending programs in medium wave frequency. they highest was about 188m in lenght. the stabilisation of the tower was build with steel wires to the ground. the wires had isolators at the end with a cable bridge to secure the towers to ground (earth) from electrostatic charging. the mass of metal in the towers made the electrostatic athmosphere effect very dangerous. my dad demonstrated this to me on a sunny day, he got safety clothes on and attached the ground cable. an ca. 10 cm long electric flash appeared. later he told me, that on rainy days there can be one flash about 30 cm and there can be ca. 10000v and more &nbsp;in it and a lot of current strenght.

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• AL

  @alx9r · 2 years ago (edited)

  In North America I often see “common” on schematics where it’s not really an earth ground like, for example, on circuit boards and vehicles. &nbsp;I have been involved in many situations where that distinction indeed matters, and the more experienced the electrician or electrical engineer, the more they seem to care about the distinction in the documentation.<br><br>My circuit board designs often have had a different net for common and earth ground so that the coupling between the two can be managed.

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• MA

  @mattymerr701 · 2 years ago

  Ground loops are one of those things that really deserve explaining. They are unintuitive and can have some major impacts on circuits, even ones that are seemingly unrelated.

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• SC

  @scorch855 · 2 years ago

  Fun fact: One of the main hurdles to establishing a Mars colony connecting the Earth wire. The amount of resistance is crazy!

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• AL

  @alvkraft · 2 years ago

  <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNPIL7rhKUw&amp;t=459">7:39</a> That&apos;s truly a PCB torture machine!

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• TH

  @ThomasDwyer187 · 2 years ago

  excellent video, bromigo. :elbowcough: Grounding is a deep subject and you&apos;re giving some very clear explanations

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• LE

  @Lemonickous · 2 years ago

  It&apos;s very important to ground our knowledge in the basics.

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• MA

  @MarkSJBeard · 2 years ago

  A couple of clarifications, one short, one long.<br><br>1) My understanding is that in North America the use of the term Ground is synonymous with Earth. In Europe we tend to use Earth to refer to the Protective Earth (PE) connection, and sometimes a functional earth in RF systems, and use the term ground for all other functional 0V connections.<br><br>2) There can be many different earth/ground networks for many different reasons in a system, and these are often designated using different symbols in schematics and on connector markings. When using international electrical safety standards, such as ISO, IEC and EN standards, the symbol usually used by Great Scott consisting of three horizontal lines with decreasing length top to bottom, making a roughly triangular shape, is reserved for the Protective Earth (PE) connection only. Functional ground connections, such as the common 0V network in analogue and digital circuits, and which is not intended to carry fault current to protect users from electric shock, use different symbols. In my design schematics I use an open triangle for low current functional ground networks and a filled triangle for high current power ground connections. Some people use a thick horizontal line instead. But I only ever use the three horizontal line symbol for PE connections to conform to safety standards. I wouldn’t want my circuit to be misunderstood and for an electrician to wire a PE connection to a circuit that was not capable of handling fault currents and was not connected to Protective Earth by a sufficiently low impedance to ensure safety in the event of a fault.

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• PH

  @Phantom-mk4kp · 2 years ago

  I think it was a big mistake that we chose the word &quot;ground&quot; for the neutral rail of electronics. So many people think earth and ground are the same thing.

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