7 ms·

L.A. County made us drive FOUR 8 foot ground rods into the ground, no less than 8 feet apart, for our ground-mounted 13 kW solar array. This is ridiculous beyo

L.A. County made us drive FOUR 8 foot ground rods into the ground, no less than 8 feet apart, for our ground-mounted 13 kW solar array. This is ridiculous beyond description and it is NOT in the N.E.C. at all. The problem you run into with places like L.A. County is that incompetent plan checkers just want to play "cover my ass" and make up rules. There is no practical way to challenge them. They are the absolute authority (unless you have millions of dollars and YEARS to fight them). I checked with contractors and the recommendation was "just do it and don't complain or they'll make your project a living nightmare". So, we did. They still made the project a nightmare to complete. They added a massive chunk to the overall cost and it took six months longer than it should have taken to complete it. Their interference made it such that this solar system will likely never recover the construction costs. Well, maybe in 30 years. It's a shame. Had I known the nightmare it is to deal with this bureaucracy I would have invested my money elsewhere. California is sucking more and more with time. L.A. County is even worse.

ademup 7y ago
A 5/8" x 8' copper grounding rod is $14 at Home Depot; 3\4 x 10 is $33. I'm very confused on how the extra $100 would meaningfully affect the project in either time or BOM.
- RyJones 7y ago
  there's more to it than putting a copper rod in the ground.
- mattrp 7y ago
  I’ve installed a bunch of these for myself. You always think about what you might be driving the stake through or if you’re going to hit rock... but you do have a point: after the cost of the rods, there’s the cost of the sledgehammer and the ground cable to wire back to the box. Kind of hard to see how this one issue caused a great deal of expense...
- ggrrhh_ta 7y ago
  Giving the contractors a good excuse to rip off an employer they hold hostage...?
- bradknowles 7y ago
  With respect, this is like saying “but the hard drive on Fry’s discount shelf only costs $100, why is your NVME-over-Fiber SSD storage system so expensive?” Hint: what the consumer can buy over the counter, and what gets used in a professional setting, are frequently two radically different things that may only be tangentially related.
  - mlyle 7y ago
    It's the same thing that gets used. Just one little detail-- it has to get driven into the earth before use.
  - tomku 7y ago
    With respect, what you're saying is absolute nonsense in the context of ground rods. They're hunks of metal clad in copper and driven into the ground with a sledgehammer. They're so simple that there's literally no part of a modern PC that's analogous. The ones you can buy from Home Depot for $15 are identical to the ones I buy from a professional electrical contracting supplier for $15 - they come off the same factory lines from the same manufacturer. There are other components used in contracting that have a bit more product segmentation, but the whole "frequently radically different things that may only be tangentially related" bit is wildly exaggerated. We use the appropriate components for the job, and often that means the same stuff you could buy at Home Depot. You're paying for that knowledge of what's appropriate/necessary and the labor to do the work, not for super-special premium contractor ground rods.
  - thrower123 7y ago
    I've yet to see a non-industrial electrician that doesn't pick up most of their stock at Home Depot.
- mlyle 7y ago
  They're a real bitch to drive into the ground, though, especially if you have clay rocky soils. However, what I think he's saying is that despite blindly complying with this in hopes of a smooth project... the bureaucracy found other ways to make his project expensive, miserable, and slow anyways.
  - pkaye 7y ago
    They can be driven down quickly with a demolition hammer/rotary hammer.
    - mlyle 7y ago
      Never underestimate the capacity of my soil to screw things up.. I guarantee you 6' down there will be some nice really strong 50cm rock. :(
- shantly 7y ago
  > I checked with contractors and the recommendation was "just do it and don't complain or they'll make your project a living nightmare". > So, we did. > They still made the project a nightmare to complete. They added a massive chunk to the overall cost and it took six months longer than it should have taken to complete it. I read it that the excessive grounding requirements were just the beginning of a series of silly and expensive demands, which in aggregate made the project way more expensive. It's that or it took six extra months to install four grounding rods.
  - nullc 7y ago
    > It's that or it took six extra months to install four grounding rods. Given some contractors I've dealt with --- I wouldn't be shocked. (or maybe I would be shocked, ... if they were allowed to do electrical work unsupervised. :) )
- Spare_account 7y ago
  Switching from a forward slash to a back slash between clauses really threw me off. It took me three attempts to correctly parse the second clause (with "3\4" in it)
- robomartin 7y ago
  > I'm very confused on how the extra $100 would meaningfully affect the project in either time or BOM. reply That one change was the tip of a very large iceberg. They easily added somewhere in the order of $50K+ to the total cost of the system. I could have installed triple the power generation capacity for that money. BTW, I did the bulk of the work on this installation myself (with the help of my kids here and there). No general contractor involved. Had there been a contractor on the job the cost would have been far greater. Before someone jumps in and says "You probably screwed-up the design" (after all, this is HN). I designed the entire system, hired a civil engineering firm to review the design and calculations as well as provide stamped blueprints and calculations (you can't get a permit unless you have this). I also consulted with the same plan checkers throughout the design process (before hiring the civil engineering firm) as well as with my suppliers and buddies who had built similar systems. I only hired the civil engineering firm one the plan checkers told me verbally that all looked good and I should move forward, hire the engineering firm and submit the drawings and calculations for official approval and issuance of permit. I got verbal "All is good" from the structural, electrical, planing/zoning and fire plan checkers. Three days after I submitted everything for approval the very same plan checker who told me all looked good rejected the very same plans he and I had discussed during weekly meetings for about two months. Things got surreal from there. I spoke to multiple contractors from different trades during my many visits to the plan check office. I did not find one who did not have horror stories --multiple horror stories-- about dealing with these people. Anyhow, it's a somewhat distant memory now.
  - bradstewart 7y ago
    This, unfortunately, seems to be the norm here in Austin as well. There's an entire industry of building permit "expediters" you almost have to hire to avoid the nonsense. This 3rd party handles all communication with the relevant permitting authorities, and mostly correct plans get approved almost immediately.
    - robomartin 7y ago
      I got lucky in that our inspector was fantastic and very helpful. Had it not been for her help and advise it could have been worse.
echelon 7y ago
> California is sucking more and more with time. Why is this, and how do we get it fixed? Shouldn't this sort of burden be the same throughout the US?
- lwhalen 7y ago
  Nope, California has been the poster-child for Big Government for _decades_. Each year the State regularly spawns off several tens of thousands of folks who have 'had enough', who migrate to Small(er)-Government states, and then promptly start advocating for the exact kinds of policies that made them leave CA in the first place. It's a stereotype at this point, especially in places like Washington, Oregon, Texas, Montana, etc.
  - t34543 7y ago
    The state of cancer causes California
  - robomartin 7y ago
    That's the part I don't understand. Why do people leave CA and then push for the same policies? It's crazy. I don't get it.
    - lwhalen 7y ago
      I suspect it's a flaw in how humans (of certain political persuasions) rationalize "how we got here". They think "Well, the old place was OK except for this very small bit that pushed me over the edge into 'move elsewhere' territory. Now this new place is OK, but if we just enacted this little bit of legislation to be more like the place I just came from...." That in and of itself would be fine if it was extremely limited. However, when it's tens of thousands of people, and they all have different ideas of what "this little bit" that needs to change is, it's a recipe for the behavior we see now. Incidentally, this pattern is where a lot of conservative commentators are coming from when they say "liberalism is a disease". Non-liberals don't tend to exhibit this behavior - they move to an area, hunker down, shut up, and try to integrate.
supermatt 7y ago
It depends on the impedance of the soil. If impedance is too high, you need additional and/or longer rods, spaced accordingly. The code says MINIMUM of 8ft in contact with soil. MAXIMUM earth ground impedance of 5 Ohm. So you need to keep driving in rods (or use an alternate grounding system) until you are below 5 Ohm - hence your multiple rods.
- sokoloff 7y ago
  I don’t recall the NEC saying that. My recollection is that code is two ground rods, spaced 6+ feet apart, is sufficient for code without measuring resistance at all. Alternatively, if you can prove that a single ground rod has less than 25 ohms to earth, then a single rod suffices. If I have time later, I’ll try to look up the actual reference, but I remember reading and thinking “that makes no engineering sense!” so it stuck in my head.
  - supermatt 7y ago
    I think you may be right: Its actually IEEE and NFPA that recommend a maximum of 5 Ohms for the grounding system. NEC state less than 5 Ohms for sensitive equipment, 25 Ohms otherwise. (NEC 250.56) - but as you mentioned, the measurement is only taken from first rod and a second can be inserted without testing (so it could be over 25 Ohms still, but based on the code it doesnt even matter....) As an aside, its 200 Ohm in the UK (but it HAS to be measured - cant just blindly drive 2 electrodes and call it a day).
    - sokoloff 7y ago
      This discussion triggered in me the question, "Obviously, I can't just stick a meter probe in the ground [as I'd be measuring the dominant resistance of that probe rather than the grounding rod in series]. So, how would I reasonably measure the resistance of an earth connection?" I came up with the (mildly hazardous) solution of putting a 120VAC line from the power company supply down the ground rod and measuring the current flow back to the PoCo (grounded) neutral conductor and then went googling. There are a few other (safer) ways that might interest HN readers, so sharing this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yg6G5VUSsWA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yg6G5VUSsWA
plurple 7y ago
You should have bribed the inspectors. After multiple FBI investigations, LA County building inspectors have figured out that the fines are smaller than the profit. It’s surreal how openly corrupt the planning and building departments in LA are.
walrus01 7y ago
> four 8 foot ground rods > They added a massive chunk to the overall cost What? You couldn't afford four 19 dollar rods? https://www.platt.com/platt-electric-supply/Ground-Rods-Copper/Multiple/615880/product.aspx?zpid=50562 https://www.platt.com/platt-electric-supply/Ground-Rods-Copp... Or four 36 dollar rods? https://www.platt.com/platt-electric-supply/Ground-Rods-Copper/Multiple/613480/product.aspx?zpid=50564 https://www.platt.com/platt-electric-supply/Ground-Rods-Copp... PV array ground buses for something small scale will commonly be a single bare 6 gauge solid copper conductor bonded to the rods with 7 dollar hardware. Unless your setup is really huge, no more than 80 dollars of 6 gauge bare copper. It's not like you need to buy a $800 thermite welding kit.

ademup 7y ago

A 5/8" x 8' copper grounding rod is $14 at Home Depot; 3\4 x 10 is $33. I'm very confused on how the extra $100 would meaningfully affect the project in either time or BOM.

RyJones 7y ago
there's more to it than putting a copper rod in the ground.
mattrp 7y ago
I’ve installed a bunch of these for myself. You always think about what you might be driving the stake through or if you’re going to hit rock... but you do have a point: after the cost of the rods, there’s the cost of the sledgehammer and the ground cable to wire back to the box. Kind of hard to see how this one issue caused a great deal of expense...
ggrrhh_ta 7y ago
Giving the contractors a good excuse to rip off an employer they hold hostage...?
bradknowles 7y ago
With respect, this is like saying “but the hard drive on Fry’s discount shelf only costs $100, why is your NVME-over-Fiber SSD storage system so expensive?” Hint: what the consumer can buy over the counter, and what gets used in a professional setting, are frequently two radically different things that may only be tangentially related.
- mlyle 7y ago
  It's the same thing that gets used. Just one little detail-- it has to get driven into the earth before use.
- tomku 7y ago
  With respect, what you're saying is absolute nonsense in the context of ground rods. They're hunks of metal clad in copper and driven into the ground with a sledgehammer. They're so simple that there's literally no part of a modern PC that's analogous. The ones you can buy from Home Depot for $15 are identical to the ones I buy from a professional electrical contracting supplier for $15 - they come off the same factory lines from the same manufacturer. There are other components used in contracting that have a bit more product segmentation, but the whole "frequently radically different things that may only be tangentially related" bit is wildly exaggerated. We use the appropriate components for the job, and often that means the same stuff you could buy at Home Depot. You're paying for that knowledge of what's appropriate/necessary and the labor to do the work, not for super-special premium contractor ground rods.
- thrower123 7y ago
  I've yet to see a non-industrial electrician that doesn't pick up most of their stock at Home Depot.
mlyle 7y ago
They're a real bitch to drive into the ground, though, especially if you have clay rocky soils. However, what I think he's saying is that despite blindly complying with this in hopes of a smooth project... the bureaucracy found other ways to make his project expensive, miserable, and slow anyways.
- pkaye 7y ago
  They can be driven down quickly with a demolition hammer/rotary hammer.
  - mlyle 7y ago
    Never underestimate the capacity of my soil to screw things up.. I guarantee you 6' down there will be some nice really strong 50cm rock. :(
shantly 7y ago
> I checked with contractors and the recommendation was "just do it and don't complain or they'll make your project a living nightmare". > So, we did. > They still made the project a nightmare to complete. They added a massive chunk to the overall cost and it took six months longer than it should have taken to complete it. I read it that the excessive grounding requirements were just the beginning of a series of silly and expensive demands, which in aggregate made the project way more expensive. It's that or it took six extra months to install four grounding rods.
- nullc 7y ago
  > It's that or it took six extra months to install four grounding rods. Given some contractors I've dealt with --- I wouldn't be shocked. (or maybe I would be shocked, ... if they were allowed to do electrical work unsupervised. :) )
Spare_account 7y ago
Switching from a forward slash to a back slash between clauses really threw me off. It took me three attempts to correctly parse the second clause (with "3\4" in it)
robomartin 7y ago
> I'm very confused on how the extra $100 would meaningfully affect the project in either time or BOM. reply That one change was the tip of a very large iceberg. They easily added somewhere in the order of $50K+ to the total cost of the system. I could have installed triple the power generation capacity for that money. BTW, I did the bulk of the work on this installation myself (with the help of my kids here and there). No general contractor involved. Had there been a contractor on the job the cost would have been far greater. Before someone jumps in and says "You probably screwed-up the design" (after all, this is HN). I designed the entire system, hired a civil engineering firm to review the design and calculations as well as provide stamped blueprints and calculations (you can't get a permit unless you have this). I also consulted with the same plan checkers throughout the design process (before hiring the civil engineering firm) as well as with my suppliers and buddies who had built similar systems. I only hired the civil engineering firm one the plan checkers told me verbally that all looked good and I should move forward, hire the engineering firm and submit the drawings and calculations for official approval and issuance of permit. I got verbal "All is good" from the structural, electrical, planing/zoning and fire plan checkers. Three days after I submitted everything for approval the very same plan checker who told me all looked good rejected the very same plans he and I had discussed during weekly meetings for about two months. Things got surreal from there. I spoke to multiple contractors from different trades during my many visits to the plan check office. I did not find one who did not have horror stories --multiple horror stories-- about dealing with these people. Anyhow, it's a somewhat distant memory now.
- bradstewart 7y ago
  This, unfortunately, seems to be the norm here in Austin as well. There's an entire industry of building permit "expediters" you almost have to hire to avoid the nonsense. This 3rd party handles all communication with the relevant permitting authorities, and mostly correct plans get approved almost immediately.
  - robomartin 7y ago
    I got lucky in that our inspector was fantastic and very helpful. Had it not been for her help and advise it could have been worse.

echelon 7y ago

> California is sucking more and more with time. Why is this, and how do we get it fixed? Shouldn't this sort of burden be the same throughout the US?

lwhalen 7y ago
Nope, California has been the poster-child for Big Government for _decades_. Each year the State regularly spawns off several tens of thousands of folks who have 'had enough', who migrate to Small(er)-Government states, and then promptly start advocating for the exact kinds of policies that made them leave CA in the first place. It's a stereotype at this point, especially in places like Washington, Oregon, Texas, Montana, etc.
- t34543 7y ago
  The state of cancer causes California
- robomartin 7y ago
  That's the part I don't understand. Why do people leave CA and then push for the same policies? It's crazy. I don't get it.
  - lwhalen 7y ago
    I suspect it's a flaw in how humans (of certain political persuasions) rationalize "how we got here". They think "Well, the old place was OK except for this very small bit that pushed me over the edge into 'move elsewhere' territory. Now this new place is OK, but if we just enacted this little bit of legislation to be more like the place I just came from...." That in and of itself would be fine if it was extremely limited. However, when it's tens of thousands of people, and they all have different ideas of what "this little bit" that needs to change is, it's a recipe for the behavior we see now. Incidentally, this pattern is where a lot of conservative commentators are coming from when they say "liberalism is a disease". Non-liberals don't tend to exhibit this behavior - they move to an area, hunker down, shut up, and try to integrate.

supermatt 7y ago

It depends on the impedance of the soil. If impedance is too high, you need additional and/or longer rods, spaced accordingly. The code says MINIMUM of 8ft in contact with soil. MAXIMUM earth ground impedance of 5 Ohm. So you need to keep driving in rods (or use an alternate grounding system) until you are below 5 Ohm - hence your multiple rods.

sokoloff 7y ago
I don’t recall the NEC saying that. My recollection is that code is two ground rods, spaced 6+ feet apart, is sufficient for code without measuring resistance at all. Alternatively, if you can prove that a single ground rod has less than 25 ohms to earth, then a single rod suffices. If I have time later, I’ll try to look up the actual reference, but I remember reading and thinking “that makes no engineering sense!” so it stuck in my head.
- supermatt 7y ago
  I think you may be right: Its actually IEEE and NFPA that recommend a maximum of 5 Ohms for the grounding system. NEC state less than 5 Ohms for sensitive equipment, 25 Ohms otherwise. (NEC 250.56) - but as you mentioned, the measurement is only taken from first rod and a second can be inserted without testing (so it could be over 25 Ohms still, but based on the code it doesnt even matter....) As an aside, its 200 Ohm in the UK (but it HAS to be measured - cant just blindly drive 2 electrodes and call it a day).
  - sokoloff 7y ago
    This discussion triggered in me the question, "Obviously, I can't just stick a meter probe in the ground [as I'd be measuring the dominant resistance of that probe rather than the grounding rod in series]. So, how would I reasonably measure the resistance of an earth connection?" I came up with the (mildly hazardous) solution of putting a 120VAC line from the power company supply down the ground rod and measuring the current flow back to the PoCo (grounded) neutral conductor and then went googling. There are a few other (safer) ways that might interest HN readers, so sharing this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yg6G5VUSsWA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yg6G5VUSsWA

plurple 7y ago

You should have bribed the inspectors. After multiple FBI investigations, LA County building inspectors have figured out that the fines are smaller than the profit. It’s surreal how openly corrupt the planning and building departments in LA are.

walrus01 7y ago

> four 8 foot ground rods > They added a massive chunk to the overall cost What? You couldn't afford four 19 dollar rods? https://www.platt.com/platt-electric-supply/Ground-Rods-Copper/Multiple/615880/product.aspx?zpid=50562 https://www.platt.com/platt-electric-supply/Ground-Rods-Copp... Or four 36 dollar rods? https://www.platt.com/platt-electric-supply/Ground-Rods-Copper/Multiple/613480/product.aspx?zpid=50564 https://www.platt.com/platt-electric-supply/Ground-Rods-Copp... PV array ground buses for something small scale will commonly be a single bare 6 gauge solid copper conductor bonded to the rods with 7 dollar hardware. Unless your setup is really huge, no more than 80 dollars of 6 gauge bare copper. It's not like you need to buy a $800 thermite welding kit.