Earth Rod - How long?

[Neeranam]

I got an 'electrician' to put in a water heater for my shower. I noticed that the eart copper rod was only about 2 feet long. Is this long enough? I suspect it depends on the ground and my mate says it should be 3 m!

[Crossy]

PEA spec. says 2.5m.

Does your heater have a built-in RCD / ELCB / GFI, if it does or you have a Safe-T-Cut or similar in your distribution board it's not ideal but should be fine.

If you don't have any form of earth leakage protection you should install something as soon as possible.

[Neeranam]

Thanks Crossy!

What are the short ones for? I see them for sale in the home places.

[simon43]

Also, check that your copper earth rod is actually copper (good conductor), and not another cheap metal that has been painted copper colour. (I found ALL the earth rods that I previously purchased were 'fake')

[ksamuiguy]

The short ground rods are tipicaly used for telephone grounds.

A house ground rod should be 1.8 meter long, look carefully at the rod they are usually a steel rod with a copper clading wrapped and fused to the steel rod.

be carefull when driving the rod as you will damage the copper clading.

Remember copper/copper oxide are good conductors. RUST Will NOT/Does NOT conduct electricity, steel is a bad conductor ever when clean and new.

If in a sandy enviroment try to drive the ground rod near a drain outlet, (septic drain field is ideal).wet ground=good earth connection.

When you purchase the ground rod make sure you get a proper connector clamp for the rod you have bought. Do not drive the ground rod all the way in the ground, leave about 10-15 cm above the ground, this will allow you to observe , verify the intergity of the connection, if you hant slip a piece of PVC over the rod to protect it and make it easy to locate if necessary.