Station grounding · Georgia
We buy grounding grid conductor and bare copper
Ground grid conductor leaves a substation in one of two states: lifted clean during a rebuild, or cut out of a trench during demolition. The first is copper. The second is copper with soil, gravel and thirty years of corrosion attached, and it is reviewed accordingly.
- Bare and tinned copper
- Copper-clad steel
- Ground rods
01Overview
What this page covers
A station ground grid is bare copper, most often 250 kcmil or 4/0, buried in a grid pattern with driven rods at the intersections and connections made exothermically or by compression. Older stations used copper-clad steel for the rods and sometimes for the conductor, and some used tinned copper where sulphide in the soil attacked plain copper.
The material is straightforward; the recovery is not. Grid conductor comes out in lengths, not on reels, and it comes out with connections attached, in soil, from an excavation that someone had to permit and dig. That shapes both the review and the practical difficulty of moving it.
02Specification
What the conductor and the site tell us
- Sizes
- 2 AWG through 500 kcmil; 250 kcmil and 4/0 most common in grids
- Materials
- Soft-drawn bare copper, tinned copper, copper-clad steel
- Stranding
- Solid through 2 AWG; 7, 19, 37 and 61 strand above
- Ground rods
- Copper-clad steel, 5/8 in. by 8 ft and 10 ft, sectional rods
- Connections
- Exothermic welds, compression connectors, bolted clamps
- Standards
- ASTM B3 for soft copper wire, ASTM B8 for stranded copper
- Condition
- Lifted clean, excavated with soil attached, corroded, cut by theft
- Documentation
- Station drawing, ground grid plan, release from the owner
Tinned copper looks dull gray and is often mistaken for aluminum. A file or a scratch test settles it before the lot is described to anyone.
03Grounding material we buy
Grounding material we buy
Bare soft-drawn copper
The standard grid conductor, annealed and highly conductive. Soft temper matters: the conductor is meant to bend around trenches and rods, and a length that has been work-hardened by kinking is still copper but no longer grid material.
Tinned and coated copper
Tinned conductor from stations in sulphidic or coastal soil, and copper with a factory coating that has partly worn. The plating does not change the metal review, but it does change how the surface is described.
Copper-clad steel
Rods, and on older sites the conductor itself. Steel core, copper skin, and it is bought on copper content by a different route from plain copper. A magnet finds it immediately, which makes sorting simple.
Grid with connections attached
Exothermic welds and compression connectors come out with the conductor. They are cut off before the copper is weighed, and the count of intact connections tells a buyer how the grid was built and how it was removed.
04Evaluation
How a ground grid lot is reviewed
Size and material first, then the condition of the surface. Grid conductor has been in wet soil for decades, and the failure mode is a black, pitted surface and thinning at the point where it left the earth. Clean copper that has been lifted intact is a different lot from conductor that came out of a trench full of clay.
Quantity is the second question, and it is harder than it looks. Grid conductor is measured by length where it is intact and by weight where it is in pieces. A station ground grid plan gives a length to check against, which is a more reliable starting point than an eyeball estimate of a pile.
Release and excavation are the practical constraints. The grid belongs to the station owner, and lifting it is a digging job that usually belongs to the demolition contractor. State who is lifting it, whether the trench is open, and whether the conductor is above or below grade, because that decides whether a site visit is a walk-around or a machine job.
Cutting a ground grid in a station that is still in service is a serious act. The grid is the path that keeps step and touch potential survivable, and removing a section changes the protection for everyone working near it. Grid recovery only proceeds once the owner has retired the station and confirmed that no live circuit or cathodic protection is connected.
05Seller terms
Before you sell: how it works
Four things a seller should be able to pin down before a truck is booked.
Verification
Footage is checked against the reel tag, the sequential marks on the jacket, the wrap count against the barrel, or a published weight per 1,000 ft — whichever the reel actually supports.
Payment
Payment method and timing are agreed in writing for the specific lot before anything is loaded or moved. No verbal number is treated as an agreement.
Paperwork
A bill of sale for the lot, and for utility material the owning utility’s release reference. Neither is optional and neither is created after the fact.
Freight
Collection is arranged as part of the terms. Say what can lift the reels and whether a 53-foot trailer can reach them, and the pickup is planned around that.
Sending a reel list and photographs costs nothing. A review is not a purchase, and nothing is bought, moved or scheduled until written lot terms are agreed for that material. Request a pickup when the lot is ready.
07Questions
Grounding grid conductor questions
Is buried grid conductor worth recovering?
It depends on how much of it comes out intact. Copper that is corroded and broken into short pieces is reviewed on weight; clean lengths are reviewed as conductor.
How do you tell tinned copper from aluminum?
Scratch it. Tinned copper shows copper under a thin gray skin, weighs far more than aluminum for the same size, and does not ring when struck.
Do you buy copper-clad ground rods?
Yes, with the copper content reflected in the review. Rods are counted rather than weighed where they are straight and re-usable, and weighed where they are not.
Does the ground grid plan help?
Considerably. It gives a design length and a pattern, which is a check on the quantity and evidence of what was installed when the station was built.
Send the grid plan and the total length lifted
Whether the conductor is above grade, how much is intact and who is doing the lifting decide the review. Photographs of a cleaned section show the surface condition.