chuck wrote in news:1150376821_9981
@sp6iad.superfeed.net:

ABYC and common sense would have you ground the
neutral of the isolation transformer secondary and
use that as your equipment grounding conductor.
That way you remain isolated from the AC systems
of the rest of the world, but you maintain the
safety benefit of equipment grounding. Even GFCI
protection on the secondary wouldn't work without
that ground. You don't need the green wire for
GFCI to detect a ground fault, but you DO need a
connection to "ground" for a ground fault to
occur. So if you leave off a secondary ground, you
prevent ground faults by allowing the hot wire to
short to an equipment cabinet undetected! Not
likely to be very popular, Larry.



If the equipment on my bench is plugged into my fully isolated isolation
transformer, touching either (BUT NOT BOTH) sides of the line is no shock
hazard whatsoever, the very reason for the isolation transformer in the
first place. No equipment ground is necessary.

"Ground" is just a point, a reference, that's way overrated....and
misunderstood. Voltage never killed anyone...Voltage DIFFERENCE does.

I looked for a video I had on my old computer that was posted from a
power company. The subject of the video was the guys who fly around very
high voltage transmission lines in a helicopter, drop off a man hanging
from that line, to replaces some of the gear on the hot end of
insulators, FROM the hot end of insulators you can only get near if you
are already at that potential, several hundred thousand volts above
"ground". The most impressive part of the video is the guy sitting on
the little platform beside the helicopter's skids with a buzz stick in
his hands sticking out as they approached the line. The high voltage
reaches out 10's of feet in a fairly amazing arc to the end of the buzz
stick until the helo gets close enough to actually attach the helo's
chassis to the high tension power line, putting them both at several
hundred thousand volts off "ground" so men and parts can be transferred
as the expert pilot holds the helo rock still against the line.

Sorry I can't find it in the stacks of CDRs and DVDs piled around here.
It was a great movie to watch. JUST DON'T TOUCH GROUND WHILE YOU'RE OUT
THERE AND YOU'RE FINE!...(c;

It's all about your "reference"....