How to test if I am grounded properly to work with electronics?

[tggzzz]

You clicked a random spambot's link (they got what they wanted) and are now replying to the spambot.

The website is ChatGPT output. See https://www.eevblog.com/forum/testgear/bench-multimeter-for-someone-learning/msg4786409/#msg4786409

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[paulca]

Beginner to beginner.

Low voltage breadboards.  Safest bet if you don't yet have an actual current limited PSU is to use 9V batteries and buy yourself some linear LM78* regulators for your breadboards.  This should prevent "finger burns" and keep some magic smoke in the parts.

Grounds:
When anything at all goes wrong with your circuit, especially if it's "weird" and unexpected.  Check ALL grounds first.  Ground, 0V, -, whatever your particular learning material or PSU/battery calls it.  The "common" thing (other than the + voltage) that all connects everything together.  It is usually the most critical part of the circuit that all of those remain connected and uninterrupted.  Any of them coming adrift will usually case the circuit to behave badly until fixed.

Beyond that.  If you are referring to "ground" in terms of the protective earthing in your house, or the mains ground.  STAY WELL AWAY.  Stay on the save end of a galvanically separated low voltage DC power supply.

The only exception would be the use of an anti-static braclet or mat connected to a plug earth.

The theory of "grounding" and "earthing" will follow you throughout your electrics and electronics learnings and dabblings throughout your life.  It always gets more complicated.  No matter how deep you dig into that rabbit hole it keeps opening new chambers.

You will encounter a few in beginner experiments.  Pay attention to them and ponder about them a good while.  Experiments involving "floating" gates on transistors etc.  It's worth pondering what is actually happening there.  Especially as you are studying physics.  If/when you do those experiements, go and read your physics chapters on Maxwell.  It will open your eyes to what electricity is.

[tggzzz]

The theory of "grounding" and "earthing" will follow you throughout your electrics and electronics learnings and dabblings throughout your life.  It always gets more complicated.  No matter how deep you dig into that rabbit hole it keeps opening new chambers.

You will encounter a few in beginner experiments.  Pay attention to them and ponder about them a good while.  Experiments involving "floating" gates on transistors etc.  It's worth pondering what is actually happening there.  Especially as you are studying physics.  If/when you do those experiements, go and read your physics chapters on Maxwell.  It will open your eyes to what electricity is.

Precisely

"Ground" and "earth" are fictions that have some use in some circumstances.

Many parts of electrical wiring and installation codes appear on the surface to be weird and unnecessarily proscriptive/restrictive. They are there because of edge cases, unwarranted presumptions, lack of understanding, and the imperfections found out there in the wild. Ignore the codes at your peril (I don't care) and other people's peril (I do care).

[paulca]

As a beginner.

"The only exception would be the use of an anti-static braclet or mat connected to a plug earth."

Even this needs understanding.  There are many circumstances when you absolutely do NOT want to be grounded! 

As already warned, avoid "mains" anyway, but if you are grounded and a mains ground go away, YOU can technically become the ground.  Needless to say that is somewhat non-ideal.

>3V don't stick it up your ***
>10V don't stick it in your mouth.
>30V don't touch it with wet hands
>50V don't touch it.
>100V don't do it.

[AndyC_772]

This is one reason why ESD wrist straps contain a 1MOhm resistor. The idea of grounding the operator is to allow static charges not to build up over time, and since triboelectric charging results in a high voltage on a small capacitance, even this resistor doesn't stop the charge from leaking away harmlessly.

The resistor does, however, prevent a hazardous current flowing from energised equipment (say, at 240V) up one arm, through the chest, down the other, and to earth via the wrist strap.

Tip: despite this, it's still standard practice NOT to wear an ESD wrist strap when working on live equipment.

[Siwastaja]

There are zero circumstances where you would not want to connect the ESD mat into the protective earth of the building, if that is available in the plugs of the same room. It is always the right thing to do, and all 3-prong appliances do that, expose this safety earth directly accessible to user's touch (not through any resistors). If you fear touching the ESD mat, then you can't use any metal cased 3-prong appliances, they are all dangerous.

1-Mohm resistor is not for safety, debugging live mains-powered things requires completely different approaches and would not recommend doing that at all. Although if everything else fails and you are doing things you definitely should not be doing, that 1Mohm resistor can then work as a final safety layer it's not intended to be. As long as you don't touch the radiator, toaster etc. which still expose that scary mains thing (protective earth), without any 1Mohm resistors.

Theory of "grounding" is simple in this case: the protective earth happens to be the connection which carries most parasitic paths to all sorts of building materials around the house. Thus by connecting to it, you have best chances of equaling charges and prevent ESD zaps.

[m k]

One misguiding thing is to think that connected things are a single point.

Yes but I would be uncomfortable.

Why?

Uncomfortable about some residual risk to the equipment? Or to yourself?

To the equipment.
Something like that there is still something that is far from something else.

It's also psychological.
Feeling that high is bad and low is good.

I also know that low can still move a limb, especially if other end is a transformer and behind it is a can size elco, but that is different.

[m k]

The problem with ESD is that you can’t feel it. So you don’t know whether your measures have actually succeeded in reducing ESD risk. (By the time a static discharge becomes something we can detect with our body, we are far beyond the charges needed to damage parts.)

Lifting an empty styrox coffee cup from the table can be it, if moon phase is right and great maker approves.

[paulca]

HVDC shocks are not fun or funny.  AC Mains shocks are even less funny. 

I have had both.  DC throws, AC sucks is at least partly true. 

My DC shock (at 13yo.) resulted from trying to find out what is under the sucker on the back of a 14" CRT monitor, 2 minutes after it had been disconnected from the mains.  For me it was instant, but I am not sure if it was or not.  I felt the thump of the wall and then I was wondering why I was shaking like a leaf and too weak to move much.  I lay in shock for a good few minutes, but the feeling of panic subsided as my muscle control came back.

I've had a multitude of minor encounters with mains.  Getting zapped by cheap DC adapters after you unplug them because they don't have a decent snubber.  That produces an "Awwooo!!  DAMN!" response.

Finding the one weakness in a UK mains plug was my more series mains shock.  I grabbed a plug to pull it from the wall.  My thumb on the top of the plug and fingers on the other corner.  The back popped off the plug and my thumb found the Earth pin and my fingers the Live pin.  That HURT.  Worse I was parallized.  I couldn't move.  I believe I was trying to cry out in pain, but just making a horrible gurgling mumbling sound.  As panic set in I realised I still had some control over my legs and so I let my knees go and fell to the ground, pulling my hand clear of the plug.  Not even a burn mark, but I shook for hours afterwards.

Either of both of those events would be considered "automatic fatality" in safety literature.  I am a very lucky boy.

[tggzzz]

One misguiding thing is to think that connected things are a single point.

I've been trying to point that out to someone experiencing noise on a breadboarded circuit. While they seem to have some knowledge of electronics and components, I don't think the point has sunk in.

Oh well.

[tggzzz]

HVDC shocks are not fun or funny.  AC Mains shocks are even less funny. 

I have had both.  DC throws, AC sucks is at least partly true. 

My DC shock (at 13yo.) resulted from trying to find out what is under the sucker on the back of a 14" CRT monitor, 2 minutes after it had been disconnected from the mains.  For me it was instant, but I am not sure if it was or not.  I felt the thump of the wall and then I was wondering why I was shaking like a leaf and too weak to move much.  I lay in shock for a good few minutes, but the feeling of panic subsided as my muscle control came back.

I've had a multitude of minor encounters with mains.  Getting zapped by cheap DC adapters after you unplug them because they don't have a decent snubber.  That produces an "Awwooo!!  DAMN!" response.

Finding the one weakness in a UK mains plug was my more series mains shock.  I grabbed a plug to pull it from the wall.  My thumb on the top of the plug and fingers on the other corner.  The back popped off the plug and my thumb found the Earth pin and my fingers the Live pin.  That HURT.  Worse I was parallized.  I couldn't move.  I believe I was trying to cry out in pain, but just making a horrible gurgling mumbling sound.  As panic set in I realised I still had some control over my legs and so I let my knees go and fell to the ground, pulling my hand clear of the plug.  Not even a burn mark, but I shook for hours afterwards.

Either of both of those events would be considered "automatic fatality" in safety literature.  I am a very lucky boy.

I lightly brushed the finger on one hand against a live thyristor can and a finger on the other against neutral. Both biceps contracted very fast, breaking contact.

Another lucky person.