March 23, 20224 yr Been up and down the internet and youtube and feel even more lost than I did when I started. Please either point me in the right direction or please explain to me in plain understandable English (I am not a sparky). Do I need an earth spike to ground my solar panels? If yes, can I join panels together at the Earth point on it and then run a cable to the earth spike or must each panel have its own cable running to a central point before going to earth spike? Do I need an earth spike to ground my inverter? Any specific location where the spike must be? For info: Deye 8Kw inverter grid tied 14 655W panels on aluminum rail on tile roof Located in Johannesburg
March 23, 20224 yr Yes you need one - esp living in JHB with all the lightning we get. The spike needs to drive at least 1.5m into the ground - deeper = better I can't answer the other part of the questions im afraid - need more knowledgeable folk to do that Edited March 23, 20224 yr by mzezman
March 23, 20224 yr What brand solar panels are those? If Canadian Solar, the grounding (including the required hardware) is explained in details in the Canadian Solar installation manual.
March 23, 20224 yr Author 2 hours ago, mzezman said: Yes you need one - esp living in JHB with all the lightning we get. The spike needs to drive at least 1.5m into the ground - deeper = better I can't answer the other part of the questions im afraid - need more knowledgeable folk to do that Thank you. Will wait for further answers. 1 hour ago, PowerUser said: What brand solar panels are those? If Canadian Solar, the grounding (including the required hardware) is explained in details in the Canadian Solar installation manual. yip. Canadian. I read the manual and see that I can connect together. Thanx for that. just need to know where to place the spike.
March 23, 20224 yr I'd suggest that any 'extraneous conductive' items that form part of the fabric of the building such as metal roof sheets, solar panels, satellite dishes etc should be 'earthed' (supplimentary bonded) using at least a 10mm wire that goes to the main earth terminal of the electrical installation. You don't need to wire each item back to the MET individually, you can daisychain the items. Generally speaking you start getting into a world of problems if you have metal items in the same building on separate earths and it can become dangerous unless particular attention is paid to the physical separation of these different earthing zones.
March 24, 20224 yr 11 hours ago, Marv said: using at least a 10mm wire that goes to the main earth terminal of the electrical installation Now you have just increased the confusion level 10-fold! Some say earth spike, you say earth to DB... Which is it?
March 24, 20224 yr Author 3 minutes ago, FixAMess said: Now you have just increased the confusion level 10-fold! Some say earth spike, you say earth to DB... Which is it? To my understanding (and I am new to this, so I am probably wrong) Panels goes to spike Inverter goes to DB. Correct me if I am wrong?
March 24, 20224 yr 2 hours ago, Slaki said: To my understanding (and I am new to this, so I am probably wrong) Panels goes to spike Inverter goes to DB. Correct me if I am wrong? can't imagine having to ground the inverter with an earth spike.
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