Solar Grounding help

[haf1zur]

Hi

new to the forum so please bear with me, this may be a simple question for most but being a newbie i dont really know

er indoors decided she wants a green house, so got one and put it up, but now its too cold to keep plants unless its heated, so decided to get a 3ft tubular heater, but knowing it will need to be on pretty much all day i realised its going to cost a bomb in electricity from the rip off suppliers

so i decided to get a solar panel, 50w mono panel with a 10amp 12v charge controller, today arrived the battery and the inverter and i set everything up, only each time i go to switch on the inverter i am getting mild electrical shocks, did some google searching and found that either the pv panel, battery or the inverter needs grounding. maybe even all three, this is where lies the problem

upon searching i came across various diagrams, some suggest the battery negative to be grounded, some suggest the pv panels to be grounded and some suggest the inverter to be grounded while another suggested the battery and the pv panel to be grounded

its a simple setup, solar panel to charge controller, charge controller to battery, battery to inverter and inverter to temperature controller which the tubular heater is plugged into (wont let me post a pic or link)

so if anyone can give me a simple answer please:

should i ground all three or two or one of the items

thanks in advance

 

[sedgy34]

earth it then to a rod

 

[haf1zur]

thats what i am asking, what part of the setup needs earthing?

 

[sedgy34]

thats what i am asking, what part of the setup needs earthing?

your inverter and battery will have earth connections

anyway i know you have started this small project but unless your growing cannabis
your plants will survive with a cover over them or bag them up

 

[haf1zur]

your inverter and battery will have earth connections

anyway i know you have started this small project but unless your growing cannabis
your plants will survive with a cover over them or bag them up

Not cannabis, though once upon a time that may of been an idea, mum grows Indian Naga Chillis, they grow best in hot environments, I love them with pretty much all my food, usually when autumn comes she brings the plants indoors, but that's not an option as I have a little one running around this year

The inverter doesn't have a ground connector, so i guess its the battery

Thanks for your help

 

[Gavin A]

I've rarely known a small stand alone battery and small inverter to need to be earthed - they are actually more protected from electric shock by not being earthed, as they are a circuit that's separated from earth.

That said, follow the inverter manufacturers instructions, you may need to bond the outer casing or something.

on a more negative side, I suspect your set up is doomed to failure, as a 50W panel is going to do very little for you going into winter, and will barely keep the battery topped up and the inverter inefficiency covered - you should really have found a 12v heater so you didn't need to be powering an inverter 24/7 just to supply a bit of heat. Unless it really is a tiny and well insulated greenhouse.

 

[haf1zur]

on a more negative side, I suspect your set up is doomed to failure, as a 50W panel is going to do very little for you going into winter, and will barely keep the battery topped up and the inverter inefficiency covered - you should really have found a 12v heater so you didn't need to be powering an inverter 24/7 just to supply a bit of heat. Unless it really is a tiny and well insulated greenhouse.

It is a small house, have 6 plants about 3 ft high so dont need much to keep them warm, the other night when it was -1 outside the inside was around 10 degrees, have sealed it pretty tight with no way of air escaping. During the day i heat it with a fan pushing air in from the kitchen, night time is what i need it for.

I did actually search for 12v heaters but the only ones i found were the kettle like campervan water heaters

This to be honest is a starting point for myself experimenting, as funds allow i don't mind adding to the Setup to increase the capacity etc., charge controller says it can handle 200w input, so a couple more panels is not out of the question if it would help, the heater is only a 100watt system.