Electrical Shock

Rivets are not allowed by code. Bolts or threaded inserts are allowed to attach bonding lugs. And the bolt and lug should make contact with bare metal of the legs. Then you can corrosion proof on top of it.

Lprecords said:

I called the company that did the electrical work and told them about being shocked. They sent the same guy out who, before I even got home, drove an 8 foot rod into the ground by the pump and rerouted his grounding wire from the outlet through the lug on the pump and then to the rod. I am hoping this is correct. He said bonding and grounding were the same thing. I didn't want to argue with him so I let it be. Anyway, my question is, can I run my new copper (I spent 2 days digging a trench) around the pool and back to the same rod, only using a different connecting lug? Will that work for the bonding or must it go to the pump? BTW, I am using threaded rivets and stainless steel screws to secure the lugs to the legs of the pool. I am also going to link my metal fence onto the ring as well.
Thanks for your help and advice

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A ground rod shouldn’t have been necessary from my understanding.

Grounding and bonding are not the same thing. All metal objects within 6 feet of the pool, the pump, the pool shell, and the water, should all be “bonded” together and to the ring surrounding the pool. The important thing is that all of these things are connected to one another with copper. That results in all of these things being equal voltage, which prevents current from moving between one thing and another, thereby preventing a shock when touching two different things. The bonding connector on the outside of the pump is where this should connect to the pump. Nothing else should connect to that bonding lug on the outside of the pump.

The only thing that needs to be grounded is the pump itself. There should be 3 wires going to the pump from the electrical outlet, and they should all connect to the wire connectors inside the pump. The green or bare of these wires is the ground. The pump is grounded through your main house ground, because the ground wire for the outlet ultimately goes all the way back to the ground bar on the panel.

So in summary:
The bonding ring should be connected to the bonding lug on the outside of the pump. Nothing else should be connected to that bonding lug.

There should be only one ground wire, running from the outlet to the inside of the pump. If your pump is a plug-in model, this ground wire is a part of that cord/plug.

Edit: The document from my city has some decent pictures/illustrations. Starting on page 4.

Lprecords said:

Here is the wiring. He came out of the house, hooked up to a gfi, then ran #8 copper to the lug on top of the pump where I already had my copper attached. I foun the grounding screw on inside cover which already has a green wire attached to it. It seems too small to wrap this hick copper around.

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It looks like there are two wires connected to the same bonding lug on the outside of the pump. One looks to be going underground, which would be correct. Where does the other wire go?

Bonding and grounding are not the same. You never directly connect the bonding grid to a ground rod.


In addition code specifies a house only have one grounding location for electrical and everything should be wired back to that ground point.

I don’t know what to tell you other then bring another electrician in with a better understanding of pool bonding and electrical.

Wow ya get another electrician. That grounding rod might introduce new problems.

Just caught up on this thread.
Definitely Un hook the ground rod from your bonding system ! If its sticking up (trip hazard) u can beat it in the ground flush or pour water around it so u can pull it out.
& don’t call him back.
Note all the yellow lines in this diagram- thats the bonding wire - its only connection to earth should be the buried wire around your pool. Also please do as instructed earlier & attempt to find the stray voltage as well. Maybe a well pump or something of that nature? obviously something changed recently. You can try turning off breakers while testing for voltage to see if you can narrow it down as @JohnT mentioned.

It shouldn’t- like i said it may be a trip hazard so just remember its there or wop it down more. Every circuit on your service should ground In the same place. You generally shouldn’t have multiple ground rod connections on a residence unless u have 2 services or other special circumstances. A pool isn’t one of them.

Mdragger88 said:

Just caught up on this thread.
Definitely Un hook the ground rod from your bonding system ! If its sticking up (trip hazard) u can beat it in the ground flush or pour water around it so u can pull it out.
& don’t call him back.
Note all the yellow lines in this diagram- thats the bonding wire - its only connection to earth should be the buried wire around your pool. Also please do as instructed earlier & attempt to find the stray voltage as well. Maybe a well pump or something of that nature? obviously something changed recently. You can try turning off breakers while testing for voltage to see if you can narrow it down as @JohnT mentioned.
View attachment 163558

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Follow this to wire your pool electric. I did all my electrical this summer and did something similar - except I only bonded my pool shell on one of the bolts where the pool wall came together. My inspector was OK with that and just complained that the way they build pools this days - there is only 1 place to bond the wall. The NEC is kind of confusing when it comes to this detail. I know a guy that writes electrical code and he told me I would be OK with 1 bonding point.

AJ.A said:

Follow this to wire your pool electric. I did all my electrical this summer and did something similar - except I only bonded my pool shell on one of the bolts where the pool wall came together. My inspector was OK with that and just complained that the way they build pools this days - there is only 1 place to bond the wall. The NEC is kind of confusing when it comes to this detail. I know a guy that writes electrical code and he told me I would be OK with 1 bonding point.

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The only one bonding point (@wall bolts) is only an exclusion for pools with resin uprights. I do believe the op has steel uprights.

Mdragger88 said:

The only one bonding point (@wall bolts) is only an exclusion for pools with resin uprights. I do believe the op has steel uprights.

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Thank you for the clarification. I could never really get a straight answer.

Mdragger88 said:

The only one bonding point (@wall bolts) is only an exclusion for pools with resin uprights. I do believe the op has steel uprights.

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FWIW, my AHJ only required one bonding point to the pool shell, even though I have steel uprights. The way I have understood it is that the code is somewhat ambiguous as to whether 4 points should be required on a vinyl-lined pool, so different inspectors interpret it differently.

From a safety standpoint I would think one solid point on the pool shell would be fine, but I’d follow whatever your local inspector requires.