"How do you ground a light bulb, and a motor inside a plastic case?"
Same way you complete any other ground - since ground and neutral are literally on the same leg (go look at any installation. You've got TWO wires coming in at the mains, ungrounded.)
So, tell me, how do you ground those ungrounded 240/277V wires??
You don't. Both of them ARE the natural ground dependent upon whether you're at the peak or trough of the waveform. That's kinda how AC works.
Where I am from we have installations differently.
phase and neutral come in the box, they go through a loss breaker(RCD) and then split up in to multiple breakers.
Then those wires go to the socket.
Then near the box there is a metal rod in the ground with a wire going to the box, this wire connects to the ground wires coming from sockets.
The ground wire, is not connected to anything but things that are not supposed to have any power flowing through.
Yes Neutral is grounded (outside my house, on the main)
But when we say we ground things we mean the third connection.
Sorry, didn't know it was so different over there.
edit: Saw the correct name for the "loss breaker" in other post, it is RCD :)
edit: Question, what happens if you hold the neutral to the ground wire there?
Yup, it's different over here. RCD (we call if GFCI here in the USA) tends to be built directly into the outlet, main breakers installed at the box. You guys generally tend to run 240/277V series-ring wire runs, though, yes? We run parallel circuits here.
240V, What we usually do here is run wires to a light point and fan out from there (the light fixture has a small box above it), small rooms can be grouped together by connecting the two boxes. Heavy appliance sockets get separate circuits, and kitchens usually have most circuits.
So parallel mostly.
ground and neutral are literally on the same leg (go look at any installation. You've got TWO wires coming in at the mains, ungrounded.)
Forgive my ignorance, I'm no electrical expert, but did you just say that the ground wire is connected to the neutral somewhere in the circuit? Or did I misunderstand you?
That's exactly right. Ground is always tied to neutral in a single-phase 120V installation. Open your breaker box and remove the front panel. You'll see it. http://i.imgur.com/hCY1jV0.png
EDIT: That "always" is assuming the house is modern wiring and not older-style two-prong wiring for the wall outlets. Those systems were just main and neutral at the box and controlled by a fusible link.
Intriguing. I'm from the UK and I believe we do it differently here because I have an RCD on my earth bar in the consumer unit. The RCD detects current on the earth wire and cuts power to the circuit instantly. An earth fault doesn't trigger the circuit breaker, it triggers the RCD. A fault between live and neutral would trigger the circuit breaker.
If I'm understanding you correctly, in the US the ground wire is functionally identical to the neutral due to the bonding. Therefore (this is my own deduction and I'd appreciate being corrected if I'm wrong) you could, in theory, invert the ground and neutral wires in the plug of an electrical appliance and there would be no change in the behaviour or safety of the appliance?
"you could, in theory, invert the ground and neutral wires in the plug of an electrical appliance and there would be no change in the behaviour or safety of the appliance?"
Generally, no. I've seen backwards wiring jobs cause 48-80VAC to run through the casing of microwaves (they usually use the casing as a floating ground.) Any wiring inversion will usually cause some issue somewhere.
This is fascinating, I'm reading lots of resources attempting to understand how this works. Thanks for your responses, I appreciate you taking the time to do that.
Same way you complete any other ground - since ground and neutral are literally on the same leg (go look at any installation. You've got TWO wires coming in at the mains, ungrounded.)
So, tell me, how do you ground those ungrounded 240/277V wires??
You don't. Both of them ARE the natural ground dependent upon whether you're at the peak or trough of the waveform. That's kinda how AC works.