ground rod
 

I have a question .I have plastic pipes in my house and need to install a ground rod ,so after I install the rod where do I run wire to from rod

ground buss in main panel.

Run the wire (#6 copper; grounding electrode conductor) non-stop from the ground rods to the main panel neutral bus.

In the main panel the ground bus does need to be bonded to the neutral bus either using a jumper bar or a #6 jumper wire or having both busses making good metal to metal contact with the panel body. A screw provided for the purpose that digs into the panel back is a suitable bonding.

You need two 8 foot ground rods at least 6 feet apart.

For those eavesdropping who already have a grounding electrode conductor non-stop from the panel to a metal water pipe exiting the house underground, the GEC from ground rods added later can be clamped onto the existing GEC if it should reach that first.

Note that the "main panel" is where the first master disconnecting switch/breaker is located, not necessarily the panel with the greatest number of branch circuit breakers.

What about rural settings? Quite often the meter is mounted on a pole (not the residential structure) with a customer disconnect immediately below the meter. Then, 3 conductors (overhead or underground) feed the 1st panel of the structure. This panel possesses the ground rod, but it does not possess the "first" disconnecting means. It is at the pole. So...Is the code such that a 4-conductor service should feed the structure's first panel?

That is the code with one caveat...there should be rods at the pole, the house fed with a 4 wire, and rods at the house.

I've never seen grounding at the pole beyond that which comes with the pole. And I've never seen a 4-conductor main service (meaning from pole to panel). Maybe I'll look harder. :)

Why 2 rods?

Despite all the misinformation out there, 2 rods is code unless you can prove one rod provides less than 25 ohms of resistance to earth. Then only one rod is required.

Correct.....in other words....it's cheaper and quicker to pound in a second rod than do the testing........and in the grand scheme of things....most likely more reliable.

Reliable for what? Do 2 or 4 or 10 rods really offer significantly greater safety from lightning than 1 rod? What data set can really demonstrate this hypothesis?

It's not for lightning protection, it's an alternate, safe path for errant current from faulty wiring, etc, to return to earth....instead of through you

No its NOT... it IS for lightning protection. Current does not seek the EARTH!

The 25 ohm rule is a hard one to swallow, no one knows why it exists, to make life easy, we drive two rods and leave it at that, hell, does ONE rod do anything?

But it does seek the much lower resistance of a copper grounding system than, say, the impedance of human, wood, brick, glass, rubber, plastic, right?

Lighting sure does though.