Comment by walrus01
5 hours ago
It's a bit worrying the author is asking chatgpt about the tingle rather than making sure there's a grounding lug on all the panels and they're all bonded to a grounding rod.
The rudimentary nature of the setup makes me think there isn't something like a single conductor 12awg (or euro equivalent) copper wire that bonds to all panels and a basic $30 rod.
Eh, compared to what though? Compared to speaking to licensed electrician, definitely. But compared to doing a raw web search and trying to put the information in the right order for the application you’re currently working on, I think it’s at worst a wash.
> a wash
Well done on this cleanly-executed pun.
Took four open weight models to land it. And you are giving me way more credit than I am due.
The system in question does not have a transformer so a grounding rod is not required as it is not a separately derived system.
The equipment grounds should be tied together to prevent any difference in potential though.
There are many different ways to connect solar panels to the inverter. Usually the exposed metallic parts will be “grounded” (bonded to the ground / protective earth / equipment grounding conductor / whatever your jurisdiction calls it at the inverter).
But this is an array that looks a bit remote from any structure, and even if the electronics themselves are utterly, perfectly safe, the bonding wire will cause the panel frames to be at the potential of the inverter’s ground, and the soil will be at whatever its local potential is, and this may be different, resulting in a “touch potential”. You can mitigate this with a supplemental ground (or whatever your jurisdiction calls it) closer to the panels. There are fancy ways to do this particularly well to improve safety in the event of a fault.
If you are contacting the actual power wiring of the solar array, something is wrong. If you are feeling capacitive coupled current from the power wiring of the array, then I imagine this means your inverter has crappy filtering, and again the only way you would feel it is if the panel frame isn’t at the same potential as the local soil.
Oh, and if you live somewhere prone to lightning, you probably want to give a possible lightning strike to the panel a better route to a high quality ground than through the bonding wire to your house.
(In fact, in many parts of the world, including IIRC 48 US states, the power utilities may operate their distribution networks with a current carrying wire (combined neutral and ground) that is grounded at multiple points along its route, which will generate substantial leakage current through the ground. The exceptions are IIRC California and Wisconsin, and IIRC those states have their rules to help protect cattle from becoming part of an undesirable circuit while being milked. In CA at least, all the distribution transformers on the poles have at least two bushings on the primary side, and this is why. I believe this is California General Order 95, rule 33 [0].)
[0] https://ia.cpuc.ca.gov/gos/go95/go_95_rule_33.html