Ground rod Getting Spark?

[Carol K]

Dicovered my fence wasn't working today. Have a 30 mile red snapper on it, and when testing with a fence tester brely gives only one light lit up. I have 3 grounds 10 feet apart and on the furthest ground it is sparking, what would cause this? Also when I put the tester directly on the charger, I have nothing, I'm at a loss what to do next, this is not a new fence so has worked fine in the past, how could a ground rod be getting a spark?

Carol K

[Karin L]

Ground could be too dry. Maybe try pouring some water around the ground rods to get something.

Another thing could be that something is "stealing" the charge so that the fence is weaker, like grass against the fence or snow or even a piece of wire.

All sorts of possibilities. Also, what kind of fence charger do you have? Solar or battery powered?

[francismilker]

If you're getting a spark where your ground wire is connecting to the rod, most likely you have a bad or corroded connection there. You might unplug the charger and tighten all the ground rod connections. It also helps to get a bit of no-oxide grease as a corrosion inhibitor and rub on the ground rod before making the connection. Does it appear to be sheened over with a green cake-like film? Or possibly small charcoal colored burn marks?
Have you removed the wire that is running out to the pasture while you're testing the charger directly? If you're getting a very weak test out on the wire you probably have something shorting it out that is hard to find and that's what is weakening your charge. If that spark finds a way to get to ground even through a partial short, you're going to notice a significantly less charge.

[Carol K]

Well my ground is very wet, so don't think it is that. I will go and unplug and check the ground that is sparking, it didn't look coroded and it was new in last year but will take apart and check it out. Two of us have walked the whole fence 3 times, boy were we frustrated, the ground sparking is the only problem we encountered, unless the underground wire (under the gates) somehow got a nick in it, but that is all new last year to.

Carol

[agmantoo]

Carol K
Disconnect the charger from the fence and then connect the tester to the two charger terminals. That will be the output of the charger and tell you if the charger is working properly. Then take a digital multimeter and connect the multimeter to the earth ground and to the fence without the charger and get the resistance reading. It should be greater than 500 ohms. If it isn't then you have too much of an earth short. If you are see the spark at the ground by having the charger on and then you are disconnecting the ground wire to the ground rod and creating a small gap that is normal, particularly if the fence has a bad short.

[genebo]

It's not cheap, but the StaFix Fence Compass has helped me out many times. You touch it to the fence and press a button. It tells you the voltage on the fence and the amount of drain on the fence at that point. Best of all, it displays an arrow showing which direction to the drain.

Follow the arrow to the short.

Genebo
Paradise Farm

[Ken Scharabok]

Different name, but I have essentially the same device as genebo. I've installed some on/off switches at corners to help as well. I run electric wire along with barbed. They seem to have an infinity to reach out and touch each other.

I have a 10K box and if everything is well get a 9.9 reading on the meter. Anything less I know there is a short somewhere.

For a while a neighbor and I had a problem with our bulls head fighting through the barb wire fence. An electric stand on both sides seems to have solved that problem.

[Oxankle]

Removable connections at each fence corner are desirable. They can be expensive switches or as simple as two insulated alligator clips with a piece of stranded wire between them. If you don't worry about a little rust, and if your charger is powerful, you can simply use a piece of fence wire with a piece of garden hose for use as a grip.

The very expensive short-finders begin to look cheap after a while. Deer and hunters are bad about wrapping hot wires around barbed.
Ox