Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

My favorite German wire-cutters have a notch in one blade caused by a wire that wasn't supposed to be live - they've come in handy in the past 15 years because they strip a 1.5mm wire perfectly, and they continue to remind me that house wiring may not necessarily be logical!

LOL, boss tol me that when he was an apprentice he and the tradie were sent to a factory to de-commission 10 or so ducted A/C units.

When he asked the tradie how they knew if the indoor ducted units were live the answer was "like this" "Snip" "BANG" "that one was live". "snip" "BANG" "yep, this one too" LOL

The maintenance man at a country pub I was working at oince asked me to twiddle the fluoro in the drinks fridge while he played with the switch. Needless to say when I picked myself up off the floor about 8 feet from the fridge, I had a very large headache and was in need of a good cuppa and a lie down LOL

Hey Mick, That's how strippers were invented! I have a pair just like yours.

haha you guys kill me dead with laughter. so its safe to say that a live wire in the fish tank water would do no harm then?

I dont know jack shit about electricty

Well, sorta

If your tank is insulated, then it'll do no harm so long as you unplug (or somehow cut the power to) the wire before anything else touches the water and the ground at the same time.

If your tank is not insulated and the live wire is connected to some sort of tripping breaker, the breaker will be tripped and the wire will go dead. No problem.

If a power line falls in your uninsulated tank (or maybe even an insulated one) you are screwed.

so are the fish!

I would not put even 10 psi in a 55 gal. steel drum they are just to thin. If you cap an empty one and put it in the sun it swells up just from the air heating up.they are so thin a sharp peace of gravle can puncture one rolling it when full.maybe a blader tank on a well? or a old water heater tank they are capable of holding 30-60 psi. there is also some pumps that run on air the amish use them to pump well water but I think they are expensive.

Hi all, Safety concerns have prompted me to attempt my first ever post, but first I want to thank Joel and everyone that contribute here for making my AP ride so much fun.

My system has a 240 volt submersible pump in a sump and the whole system is PVC or plastic so there is no way for the water to earth. Now if I’ve got this right, when the pump gets water in its motor it will not trip my houses safety switch until someone sticks their hand in the water and get zapped? If this is so would earthing the water in the sump somehow solve the problem?

if the pump is double insulated and your sump is de-coupled enough from ground (elecrically speaking) then you are correct.

I also belive you to be correct in saying that if you earthed the water would provide a means for the RCD to trip.

I THINK ITS PRUDENT AT THIS STAGE TO MENTION THAT NONE OF US (i think) ARE ELECTRICIANS, SO FROM A LEGALITY STAND POINT I'D URGE ANONE CONTEMPLATING "MODIFICATIONS" TO USE A REGISTERED ELECTRICIAN.

A submersible pump is designed to not have any electrical exposure to the water. No worries.

LOL, yeh and planes are designed not to crash

You get my drift..................

Well I wasn’t worried, even though an electric motor under water doesn’t seem right, because I thought the safety switch (RCD?) would trip if a seal, or something else failed. I am going to bang a copper pipe into the ground next to the sump and run a nice thick wire from it to the bottom of the sump just to make double shore

has any one ground their system? or would the ground on the pump be enough?. dont know just dont wanna get a shock in my rass, or the fish to get fry before i want them too

If I remember correctly, about 2 years ago I had a fish tank setup using a small submersible pump. The insulation had pulled out a bit so I just used tape to seal it up a bit. (Yes... not smart). One day I stuck my hand in there and my fingers tingled quite a bit, so if it was the wires being exposed to the water, I was getting a small electric shock. I never tested to see if that amount of current across my chest would kill me.

I have heard stories of heaters that have been broken and doing the same thing. What you need to to look for, to be safe(r) is a 3 pin mains plug, meaning that there will be some sort of earth... hopefully.

I will never have this problem when I switch to 24V pumps, which should happen soon.