Actually copper ground rods are a no no..But as a last resort they can be used. I have in the past used them and very specifically noted on the W/O why..and the customer signed off on it..Never got questioned on it...Improper grounding does in fact carry a heavy penalty. Most techs don't carry ground rods..The botton line is the guy was not BS ing you
Installer Refused to Install
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I agree..When a suitable ground is not available (extremely rare) I consult with my supervisor. We both then inform the customer of the risks involved. If he agrees then the cust must assume all liabilty and sign off to that effect. Otherwise the job goes away.
Are you in the satellite business? Because that response is the very reason why good experienced installers are getting out of this business. You imply that no matter what the installer should for the sake of getting tv, protocols should be breached..sorry I don't do things that way...I regret to inform you that there are those of us who still hold integrity and pride in our work in very high regard.
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According to SBCA it is not...here are the only acceptable satellite system grounding methods..Sorry this is a bit long...But no mention of grounding rods
1. Electrical service electrode (ground rod), or the conductor that connects the ground rod to the electrical service panel.
The ground rod must be the main electrical ground rod, or if a separate ground rod is installed, bonded to the primary ground with 6 gauge ground wire. It is a common practice among some installers to install a 5 foot ground rod and not back bond. This can lead to several problems. See part 7 for more information about installing isolated ground rods.
2. The metal electrical service panel. A Service Panel includes the meter housing, circuit breaker , or sub panel, if the sub panel is connected to the breaker panel by a rigid metal conduit. A rigid metal conduit is typically schedule 40 steel.
3. A metal electrical raceway or rigid conduit. The metal conduit or raceway that feeds power to your service meter, or runs between service panels. To ground to a conduit, a copper or galvanized steel strap is wrapped around the pipe and secured with a screw that, when tighten, pulls the clamp tight.
4. Water pipe. BUT ONLY with in five feet of the water pipes entrance to the structure and only if the water pipe is metal and in direct earth contact for at least 10 feet before entering the property. Attaching a ground wire to a water valve is NOT ACCEPTABLE and should not be accepted.
See part 7 for more information about grounding to a water pipe. Attaching a ground wire to any water pipe beyond 5 feet from where the pipe emerges from the ground is not allowed. The image to the right shows a ground wire attached to the main water service as the line exits the ground and enters the structure. The point were the water supply pipe emerges from the earth is the pipes point of entry.
5. The grounded metal structure of a building. If the buildings metal structure is grounded by one of the above means, a ground wire can be bonded to the metal structure. This is usually used with mobile homes and commercial buildings.
After reading Stone's posts on here I must confess that I lied..I don't depsise customers like him.. I HATE them...
Yes it is permissable to do a light or electrical outlet "pigtail" ground..I have doen these as well..However ina na apartment, no..That is altering the property and since the tennant does not own the property, he cannot give his consent to do this..Thanks to everybody for letting me know that the installer did the right thing.
I will probaby give up my dish for the 6 months I am in the appartment
One last question. There is a porch light neer the install location. couldn't an installer tie into the main ground system through the poarch light ground.
and that is the catch 22..Dish harps on completion rates and trouble calls...But they also harp on specs...So we're stuck..Thing is this issue of holding back work..In my area it horse poopie...there is one other contractor in the area plus a DNS office..If they take work away from us jst who ar ethey goingot give it to?...The other contratcor?..Both they and us have all the work we can handle..The DNS office would be handing out any work if they could do it themsleves..So who are they kidding..We has excellent numbers over the past 6 months, we still get the same amount of work week to week..Same amount as when our numbers were not as good..
It is ..The rebar is no good ..Why this guy didn't just ground the thing to the meter base gound wire is a mystery
Same here..No exceptions..I used to bend the rules. But I got hit on QC a couple of times and I said that's that..No more..If somebody wants me to breach protcol they will sign over their first born and pay me a lot of money....I don't like dish network anymore than you do. People like you are the reason I won't bend the rules for ANYBODY. Everytime I do somebody a favor, it bites me in the ass.
A few things:
1st...thanks for making me remember WHY I hate whiny and backstabbing customers. After re-reading (courtesy of your quoting my posts
), it just made me more angry over what people (not just Stone, either) have grown to *expect* from us as installers. Me, me, me! Gimme, gimme, gimme! Free, free, free! This is why installers need to stick to their guns and not cave in. I liken it to drawing a line in the sand. As long as you make your points and installation expectations clear to the customer, and are able to withstand the 1st few minutes of bellyaching, most people will play nice and understand WHY and HOW the installation restrictions are in place.
2ndly...LOL...I wondered why the installer for the trailer just simply didn't bond the groundblock to the metal frame of the trailer. A very common...and legal...practice.
I am supposed to bring bad jobs to spec as well. But if it's in bad shape I note the account and give the notes to dispatch..We are no longer obligated to redo installs for others on spec violations. We used to but Dish keeps denying payment for reinstalls. So we were doing all this work for nothing.
This is why you claim the "reinstall" and cite other issues (line of site, comes to mind).
Oooppss...did I say that?
The catch is Dish arbitrarily refuses payment on every one. Our office people end up having to scrap with Dish to get them to pay.This is why you claim the "reinstall" and cite other issues (line of site, comes to mind).
Oooppss...did I say that?
In the mean time we have done the work and payment for said work is held until the company gets their money. I disagree with this practice as doing business with OPM(other people's money) but this is the system we work with..
No he isn't. If he was a DNS tech, he would definently get in serious trouble. As of the start of this year, DNS has had a 100% ground policy. Some offices have been overriding the policy for appartments, as there is rarely any ground availible, but most have been sticking to it. As of now, that is the official DNS policy. The best thing for you to do is go through a retailer.
DNSC installers generally arent allowed to do crappy installs. They fail 3 QCs in a rolling 6 month period and they're out the door. More than likely the installs you say were "rigged up" were done by retailers who are only held to their own standards not Dish's.
It's only a good ground if the rest of the building is grounded to that same copper stake. Otherwise you have a differnt voltage potential for the dish ground and the apartment's electrical system.
Just a nitpick. Grounding a dish has nothing whatsoever to do with lightning. It's there to disperse static electricity that builds up on the dish and LNBF. If the dish is hit by lightning no amount of grounding is going to do anything. You're just plain screwed. The dish will be vaporised and likley half your house as well. A lightning strike carries enough power to light up a good sized city for a week. A 10 gauge wire isn't going to divert that.
Unless this has changed as well it is not allowed by dish at all due to the inherint risk's involved with an installer messing with something he knows nothing about.
Dish has always had a policy of grounding, its up to the installer to follow it and up to the lower management to also follow it.
Dish has always had a policy of doing the job right the first time but they have had to come up with very strict guidelines to enforce it as installers are doing less than stellar work. Part of this comes down on the upper managements fault at Dish as they are pushing the inhouse employee's to do bigger workloads and taking away more work from the subcontractors. Another part falls on the shoulders of lower management that the installers report to, every field service manager, installation manager and general manager that I reported to more than once had cleared me or told me to install systems without grounding, superdishes on roofs, highly questionable line of sites, pre existing rg59, no power, and one or no tv's in a multi room set up.
Yes it is to disperse static electricity but it is effective to a degrea in directing lighting to ground and is very effective at directing highpower line discharge to ground. I've seen a system take a hit from a highpower line falling on the dish and the charge followed the coax right to the ground block and into the ground, rest of the system was clean and worked once the coax was replaced along with the lnbfs. I've seen a dozen systems hit by lighting both directly and indirectly and some being grounded and others not. Its a mix of good and bad but all but two that were grounded actually functioned after basic repairs. What I had seen that surprised me was in one instance a set of coax lines had been buried 8ft deep after an old loading ramp on a farm had been back filled, lightning hit a tree about 10 ft away and it made contact with the buried coax and knocked out the whole system.
Here's what the GM pof the DNSC locval office told..Get the jobs done..Especially apartments. Do not leave an ap[atment job becuase there is no ground source. We will not be QC 'ing apartment jobs..We need the numbers on completion rates to go up.
Problem was too many apartment jobs were not being done because of the grounding issue....If there is a ground source I use it..Big note!!! I have found that mkst apartment mgmt companies DO NOT want the satellite system attached electrically to any part of the property..Fine by me...
Now, my theory on grounding....Anti litigation....Example...I install a satellite system. Lightening hits the house and it burns ot the ground..The homeowner looking for a payday discovers through their lawyer's advice the system is not gronded..Boom!!! Instant lawsuit...Lawsuit vs me ,my employer and dish network...If anyone doesn't think that would happen, fine...Don't ground your installs...BTW ground rods are a no no unles they are bonded to the house ground rod...We use them as an absolute last resort. At that point the customer is advsed and essentuilly signs off all liability against the tech and all others..This happend to me maybe three times in the 9 years where the house was not grounded to code and/or the house ground was not intact(old) or non existent...
Each DNSC office mgmt is different. Some will stick to the letter of the law, while others are flexible..It all comes down to completion rates.
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