My father wanted to kill a mole by putting a steel pipe into the ground and connecting live wire to it. I thought it would cause the short circuit but it didn’t. Why?
In: 88
To start, I’m a master electrician and instructor…
Alternating current IS NOT “trying to go to earth” per se as an “end goal”. Both AC and DC are trying to return to their source; for DC that’s generally the opposite terminal of a battery from which it left, with AC the source is the windings of either a generator or transformer. Circuits are “circles”, in the most basic AC circuit the hot and neutral are just the “top ending” and “bottom ending” of one of those windings, i.e. they are technically one conductor.
Current does not only take the *path of least resistance*, it will take *all paths available* to source that have a low enough impedance/resistance for current to flow. That means if you had a normal ground rod driven at your house for your electrical service, and drove another a few feet away and connected JUST a hot wire to it, the current would flow through the added rod, through the earth, and back up the original rod on its way back to the transformer winding. If current were “trying to go to earth/ground” as is commonly thought, this would trip a circuit breaker or open a fuse.
Also note, in AC the path of current is a bunch of electrons vibrating back and forth where in DC the electrons move from atom from the source, through the conductor and load, and back to the oppositely charged terminal.
Here’s a page with some illustrations to help it make sense if it doesn’t.
https://www.mikeholt.com/mojonewsarchive/GB-HTML/HTML/OpenServiceNeutralCausesDangerousTouchVoltageonMetalParts~20030409.htm
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