Stock Tank Deicer grounding

[TheMan419]

So we have horses. 100 gallon rubber maid stock tank. We had an outlet installed by an actual electrician to run the deicer. It is a 3 prong GFCI outlet. On its own circuit.

Wife is concerned that she is reading stories on the internet of horses getting electrocuted because the deicer was not grounded. They are recommending a ground rod. Attach wire to ground rod and place wire into tank. Weight it down with a brick so it is always in the water.

Isn't the GFCI supposed to handle things? If I plug a toaster into that outlet, turn on the toaster and toss it in the stock tank the GFCI would trip right?

According to the multi-meter the GFCI is functioning properly.

Am I missing anything other than "Just do it because SWMBO will hound you until it is done"?

 

[RNeumann]

Yah the wife needs to put down the internet for a bit. The ground rod won’t add any degree of safety to a GFCI circuit.
Maybe, in some convoluted way, someone was talking about bonding. But that doesn’t apply to you with a plastic tank or with outdoor/underground piping.

My old neighbor HAD to replace the springs in his garage door because the wife watched a tv show about a spring failure causing an injury. I’m wondering if we might be old neighbors!?!?

 

[TheMan419]

Yah the wife needs to put down the internet for a bit. The ground rod won’t add any degree of safety to a GFCI circuit.
Maybe, in some convoluted way, someone was talking about bonding. But that doesn’t apply to you with a plastic tank or with outdoor/underground piping.

My old neighbor HAD to replace the springs in his garage door because the wife watched a tv show about a spring failure causing an injury. I’m wondering if we might be old neighbors!?!?

No the only time we have replaced the springs is when the door stopped opening. She is just fanatical about the care of her horses. I think a lot of these articles about grounding predate GFCI being common. We fill the tank with a garden hose so no pipe to the tank.

As indicated the GFCI circuit was installed with the heater in mind. The electrician has done a number of other horse barns so he knew what kind of draw the heater has and advised us in terms of what he needed to install to make it all work.

 

[tcreeley]

I've used floating and stationary tank de-cers and the only ground rod is at the house where the service entry is.

The one problem I had where the horses were getting zapped traced back to a leakage on the utility's pole. I was able to measure the voltage and called the utility about it. They checked it out and found their own leakage and fixed it. Otherwise no problem in using a deicer for 35+ years without its own grounding rod. ..... But then I am not an electrician and don't always follow code!

 

[TractorGuy]

As long as the deicer maintains integrity there should not be a problem. I have seen some pump wires degrade in salt water fish tanks and you can get shocked by those. The current didn't affect the fish but when the attendants touched the metal tank edge and the water they got shocked. I found the problem with a volt meter and the water had 120V in it. I pulled those pumps and cut the wires off.

 

[dieselcrawler]

If the tank heater is plugged into a properly functioning GFI protected outlet, your horses are in no danger of getting shocked, and would be in more danger of getting poked by the wire your wife wants to add.

Licenced electrician for 20+ years, owned/operated my own contracting company for 12+ years...

 

[TheMan419]

If the tank heater is plugged into a properly functioning GFI protected outlet, your horses are in no danger of getting shocked, and would be in more danger of getting poked by the wire your wife wants to add.

Licenced electrician for 20+ years, owned/operated my own contracting company for 12+ years...

Thanks. That is what I have been trying to tell her but you know how that goes.

Outlet is gfci and was installed by licensed electrician. Multi meter verified proper operation.

 

[4570Man]

Drive a ground rod in the ground and hook it to something. Tell your wife it’s grounded. And I’d probably substitute the ground rod for something shorter and cheaper.

 

[buickanddeere]

So we have horses. 100 gallon rubber maid stock tank. We had an outlet installed by an actual electrician to run the deicer. It is a 3 prong GFCI outlet. On its own circuit.

Wife is concerned that she is reading stories on the internet of horses getting electrocuted because the deicer was not grounded. They are recommending a ground rod. Attach wire to ground rod and place wire into tank. Weight it down with a brick so it is always in the water.

Isn't the GFCI supposed to handle things? If I plug a toaster into that outlet, turn on the toaster and toss it in the stock tank the GFCI would trip right?

According to the multi-meter the GFCI is functioning properly.

Am I missing anything other than "Just do it because SWMBO will hound you until it is done"?

who ever wrote the article should be beaten with that ground rod.
Tingle Voltage is real and shocks livestock. Happens where the “electrical “ did not know the difference between ground and neutral. Over head triplex supplies to outbuildings contribute to the problem. Voltage drop on the power utilitie’s neutral can also contribute to the problem .
More of a problem with metal waterers, feeders and milking parlours. Water in a heated plastic pail supplied from a GFCI should be safe .

 

[SPYDERLK]

So we have horses. 100 gallon rubber maid stock tank. We had an outlet installed by an actual electrician to run the deicer. It is a 3 prong GFCI outlet. On its own circuit.

Wife is concerned that she is reading stories on the internet of horses getting electrocuted because the deicer was not grounded. They are recommending a ground rod. Attach wire to ground rod and place wire into tank. Weight it down with a brick so it is always in the water.

Isn't the GFCI supposed to handle things? If I plug a toaster into that outlet, turn on the toaster and toss it in the stock tank the GFCI would trip right?

According to the multi-meter the GFCI is functioning properly.

Am I missing anything other than "Just do it because SWMBO will hound you until it is done"?

Unless something goes really wrong electrocution is out of the question. However the horse being shocked slightly is not.

The problem is that the system ground bonds to neutral at the service box. There neutral is at ground and some small current flows between the two to keep it there. If the ground is very good it stays at true ZERO (impossible actually but verry close). If the quality of the ground degrades, such as in dry weather, the true zero will not be there and service box will be at that non zero ground -- perhaps a volt. The wires to your tanks run a solid wire taking that 1V potential directly to the body of the heater immersed in your horses water. The horse comes up, stomps down four ground rods establishing his true zero and pokes his mouth into water that is at a 1V potential. Fix it quick or itll be hard to undo the aversion therapy.​

We had our horses shying away from a 0.7V potential between the water and the horses grounded hooves. We fixed it by disconnecting service ground at the heater plug and connecting the ground prong directly to a ground rod driven in at the tank location.

 

[dieselcrawler]

Unless something goes really wrong electrocution is out of the question. However the horse being shocked slightly is not.

The problem is that the system ground bonds to neutral at the service box. There neutral is at ground and some small current flows between the two to keep it there. If the ground is very good it stays at true ZERO (impossible actually but verry close). If the quality of the ground degrades, such as in dry weather, the true zero will not be there and service box will be at that non zero ground -- perhaps a volt. The wires to your tanks run a solid wire taking that 1V potential directly to the body of the heater immersed in your horses water. The horse comes up, stomps down four ground rods establishing his true zero and pokes his mouth into water that is at a 1V potential. Fix it quick or itll be hard to undo the aversion therapy.​

We had our horses shying away from a 0.7V potential between the water and the horses grounded hooves. We fixed it by disconnecting service ground at the heater plug and connecting the ground prong directly to a ground rod driven in at the tank location.

Please never do that! Adding the extra ground to the existing ground wire would be fine. But disconnecting it can still allow the neutral wire to ground wire you added have a measurable voltage. You have made a more dangerous situation by disconnecting the original equipment ground. Adding to it, with another ground rod, is fine.

 

[SPYDERLK]

Please never do that! Adding the extra ground to the existing ground wire would be fine. But disconnecting it can still allow the neutral wire to ground wire you added have a measurable voltage. You have made a more dangerous situation by disconnecting the original equipment ground. Adding to it, with another ground rod, is fine.

It wouldnt work that way. The service ground held the local ground high. The only way I could get the water to local ground zero was to isolate the heater on a local ground. Neutral wires always have a small voltage relative to ground anyway when they are carrying current. At a 15A load location it could be a couple volts in a 12 Ga line.

 

[RNeumann]

Just to be clear, a deicer (at least the ones I’m thinking of) shouldn’t add any voltage to the water. If it does it’s either broke or defective.

 

[dieselcrawler]

Just to be clear, a deicer (at least the ones I’m thinking of) shouldn’t add any voltage to the water. If it does it’s either broke or defective.

Agreed

 

[buickanddeere]

Unless something goes really wrong electrocution is out of the question. However the horse being shocked slightly is not.

The problem is that the system ground bonds to neutral at the service box. There neutral is at ground and some small current flows between the two to keep it there. If the ground is very good it stays at true ZERO (impossible actually but verry close). If the quality of the ground degrades, such as in dry weather, the true zero will not be there and service box will be at that non zero ground -- perhaps a volt. The wires to your tanks run a solid wire taking that 1V potential directly to the body of the heater immersed in your horses water. The horse comes up, stomps down four ground rods establishing his true zero and pokes his mouth into water that is at a 1V potential. Fix it quick or itll be hard to undo the aversion therapy.​

We had our horses shying away from a 0.7V potential between the water and the horses grounded hooves. We fixed it by disconnecting service ground at the heater plug and connecting the ground prong directly to a ground rod driven in at the tank location.

This is why the only ground bond to the neutral is to be at the utility service . Not removing the bonding screw at sub panels or using overhead triplex is just looking for tingle voltage shocks to livestock.

 

[buickanddeere]

Please never do that! Adding the extra ground to the existing ground wire would be fine. But disconnecting it can still allow the neutral wire to ground wire you added have a measurable voltage. You have made a more dangerous situation by disconnecting the original equipment ground. Adding to it, with another ground rod, is fine.

Neutral is supposed to float free of ground everywhere on the consumer side of the service after the bond at the service .

 

[dieselcrawler]

Neutral is supposed to float free of ground everywhere on the consumer side of the service after the bond at the service .

Exactly, neutral and ground are only bonded at the service entrance equipment, but the way the posts read to me, we are talking about the equipment ground wire, not neutral wire.

 

[GregbkH]

We had our horses shying away from a 0.7V potential between the water and the horses grounded hooves. We fixed it by disconnecting service ground at the heater plug and connecting the ground prong directly to a ground rod driven in at the tank location.

I am also an electrician and am glad to see that others have warned you off of doing this "Fix". Disconnecting the equipment ground at the plug and attaching it to a ground rod with a conductor would be dangerous. If there were a ground fault the breaker may not trip at all in this configuration. The fault is trying to reach home (electrical panel) and now the fastest path to home has been taken away and put on a much slower path (ground rod) which may not get there in time if at all.

Bottom line is you are 100% safe and covered with the properly installed gfci receptacle.

 

[oosik]

When we had a horse, she WOULD NOT drink from the water trough - plastic - with the submerged tank heater installed. Removed the heater - broke the ice in the AM and again in the PM, every day. She drank then with no problems. The instructions for the tank heater gave no indications that any sort of extra grounding was required.

 

[TheMan419]

Installed new deicer today. We will see what that brings. Instructions do not specify additional ground rod. They specify properly installed gfci outlet.

Thanks all for the advice.