Hello all, hope everyone who is in the way of this hurricane is doing well and staying safe. Ok, here is my deal. I have been working on cleaning up and redoing some of my fence. I currently have a power wizard low impedance pm600 I believe. It says max output is 6 joules. The charger is 10 years old. I purchased a new Gallagher m800 with a max output of 8 joules. So, my fence checker does not read in joules it reads in Kv. So with old charger I am getting 2.4 Kv at charger and 1.5 Kv at the end of the line. With new more powerful charger I am only getting 1.4 Kv at charger and 0.2 Kv at the end of the line. I know I need to clean more off and plan on when storms are over this weekend. But why am I getting more power out of my old charger when the new more powerful one is putting out way less? I have three six feet grounding rods 6 feet apart. Thanks for your help.
Fence Charger Help
- Thread starter DB1200
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ponytug
Super Member
Sorry to hear that you are having electric fence issues. I have a few questions.
All the best,
Peter
- Where are you, and what is your land like?
- What kind of voltage meter do you have?
- Is the soil dry where you are at the moment?
- What kind of electric fencing material do you use?
- Brand?
- Age?
- Insulator type?
- How long is the fence?
- How many strands is the fence?
- Do you have vegetation touching the fence?
- Finally, what is the voltage reading at the charger when the chargers are connected to ground, and not the fence?
All the best,
Peter
I am in North Carolina and my soil is very wet as there was a hurricane come through and it stays pretty wet. Yes there is some vegetation on the fence but working on cleaning it off but there is not much. The pasture is 12 acres and 4 strands of wire. The checker I use is a Gallagher fence checker that is prob around 3 years old. I am using I can't remember now but it's thick slick wire with plastic insulaters.
JimRB
Veteran Member
What does the tester say when just the earth ground is connected, not the red or hot leg?
ponytug
Super Member
When you write "thick slick wire", do you mean solid steel wire, or something else? A photo would help.
We have had Gallagher chargers for fourteen years or so, and run two strands of poly wire rope (copper and stainless steel woven into plastic rope). My Gallaghers would put out 5-6kV onto the fence, and closer to 7kV without the fence (charger output with no fence attached to charger ground).
What kind of posts and insulators do you use? (Photo?)
I think that somewhere you must have some pretty good shorts to ground. That could be either vegetation or cracked insulators, but whatever they are, they aren't small. Have you walked your fences checking the voltage as you go, looking and listening for arcs (sparking)?
I put in some switches about a third of the way along my fence system that help me quickly find shorts. That way, I can open the switches, turn on the fence, check for good voltage, and then add the remaining pieces to find which stretch of fence has a problem, and sometimes, especially after a storm, the answer is all of them.
All the best,
Peter
kenmac
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I have this fence charger
cyclopsfence.com
I bought a specific elect. fence charger tester. Mine reads out at about 8,000 v dc. may go higher but that's all the tester reads.
I do know it will drop you to your knees if you accidently get in to it
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cyclopsfence.com
I bought a specific elect. fence charger tester. Mine reads out at about 8,000 v dc. may go higher but that's all the tester reads.
I do know it will drop you to your knees if you accidently get in to it