What does it mean to ground something?

 

Grounding is an electrical term. Although I really don't know shit when it comes to electricity, I know that most car related electronics (including the car itself) requires that it's 12V battery be 'grounded' to the chassis of the car (the negative terminal of the battery is connected to some part of the chassis). It's usually identified by a black wire.

You can likely find more info on www.howstuffworks.com .... I think I'm going to go read it myself, so I can avoid public displays of 'lack of knowledge'....


fuck I'm bored.....

 

All electrical power needs 2 wires. Kinda like 'supply' & 'return' for the electricity.

The supply line comes from the (+) terminal of the battery. First it goes thru fuses & switches & whatever...

The 'return' wire actually goes to some handy place where it's screwed down to the metal body of the car. Sometimes it's not even a wire; it's just grounded thru the mounting bracket. THAT'S called grounding. ALL the electricity flows back to the (-) battery terminal thru the car body.

Sometimes when people talk about grounding something, what they really mean is replace the existing ground wires with some bigger wires or better connectors for the ground wires.

 

Dont say that it was a stupid question. Theres always plenty of room for people to learn. Nobody knows everything.

 

awww thanks thanks to you all this really helped me out