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Electrical Ground help?
I understand most basic electronics concepts, but the idea of "ground" in a circuit that doesn't actually have a physical earth-ground is just confusing me. I see grounds on circuit diagrams all the time, but how do you actually do this when constructing the circuit!
Say you have a battery in a simple circuit that involves a ground. The plus side of the battery attaches to the +V side of the circuit, but where does the - side attach? Does it hook onto the common ground?
Am I missing something in my understanding of the meaning of "ground"? I'm pretty sure both ends of the battery have to be connected!
Is the ground kind of a strip of metal that all the "grounded" wires attach to that then attaches to the negative potential of the battery?
3 Answers
- nyphdinmdLv 71 decade agoFavorite Answer
In your battery example, you would attach the negative terminal to a metal strip or wire and every ground point in the circuit would also attach to that strip. In more complicated circuit, sya your computer, you might opt to use the metal chassis for the common ground, this is some times referred to as the chassis ground. In either case, the ground completes the cricuit as it is the final leg in the path that the current travels back to its source.
Grounding can also be used to ensure a circuit stays as the same potential as the things surrounding it. Take the chassis ground as an example. If for some reason, teh computer in the above example acquired an electric charge it would be at a different electrical potential than the room it was in. This could result in the computer user getting a nasty shock. So to avoid this, the chassis is grounded to a common point as the rest of the room (or building the room is in), usually through the electrical power cord.
- ?Lv 41 decade ago
ground or earth may be the reference point in an electrical circuit from which other voltages are measured, or a common return path for electric current, or a direct physical connection to the Earth.
Electrical circuits all need a reference point to have the flow of electrons. The earth is just used as a ground, as many power plants use it as a reference point because it's easy to do for them.
People use seperate grounds within a certain system to avoid noise due to high freqency and low freqency in the same area.
- Dr. RLv 71 decade ago
"Ground" has two general meaning in electronics. There's "Instrument ground", which means the return current bus, which is often connected to the chassis if it is metal. Then there is "earth ground", which means the potential of the (planet) earth. It is often desirable to connect instrument ground to earth ground for safety, but with low voltage (battery operated) equipment, they can just leave the former "floating". Then, there can be an arbitrary potential difference between instrument ground and earth ground.
