Ceiling installation on aluminum porch ceiling

[mark petty]

Need help on this. Many times I see ceiling fans installed to the underside of aluminum awning roofs with no junction box. I can look down into the fans cover and see wire connections. My concern is if a wire nut pops off, the whole ceiling could become energized. How should they be installed so that the fan is insulated from the metal ceiling. The close up photo shows the top of the ceiling fan housing looking down inside at the wire connections. Thanks

[Jim Luttrall]

Need help on this. Many times I see ceiling fans installed to the underside of aluminum awning roofs with no junction box. I can look down into the fans cover and see wire connections. My concern is if a wire nut pops off, the whole ceiling could become energized. How should they be installed so that the fan is insulated from the metal ceiling. The close up photo shows the top of the ceiling fan housing looking down inside at the wire connections. Thanks

There should be a junction box rated for a fan. The fans as well as the metal structure should be grounded / bonded to prevent electric shock in the event of a malfunction.

[mark petty]

There should be a junction box rated for a fan. The fans as well as the metal structure should be grounded / bonded to prevent electric shock in the event of a malfunction.

Jim thanks; how would you ground / bond the structure? A ground rod or a bond wire routed to where?

[Jim Luttrall]

A bonding wire back to the house grounding electrode. Wikipedia definition [QUOTE]Electrical bonding is the practice of intentionally electrically connecting all exposed metallic items not designed to carry electricity in a room or building as protection from electric shock (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_shock). If a failure of electrical insulation occurs, all bonded metal objects in the room will have substantially the same electrical potential, so that an occupant of the room cannot touch two objects with significantly different potentials. Even if the connection to a distant earth ground is lost, the occupant will be protected from dangerous potential differences (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potential_difference)./QUOTE]
Tie everything together and to the grounding GEC

[mark petty]

A bonding wire back to the house grounding electrode. Wikipedia definition [QUOTE]Electrical bonding is the practice of intentionally electrically connecting all exposed metallic items not designed to carry electricity in a room or building as protection from electric shock (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_shock). If a failure of electrical insulation occurs, all bonded metal objects in the room will have substantially the same electrical potential, so that an occupant of the room cannot touch two objects with significantly different potentials. Even if the connection to a distant earth ground is lost, the occupant will be protected from dangerous potential differences (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potential_difference)./QUOTE]
Tie everything together and to the grounding GEC

Got it; thanks again

[Jim Port]

The fan is bonded by way of the egc run with the circuit conductors. The connections need to be in a box.

If the outbuilding is served by a single circuit it does not require a grounding system like a rod.

[Gerry Bennett]

Need help on this. Many times I see ceiling fans installed to the underside of aluminum awning roofs with no junction box. I can look down into the fans cover and see wire connections. My concern is if a wire nut pops off, the whole ceiling could become energized. How should they be installed so that the fan is insulated from the metal ceiling. The close up photo shows the top of the ceiling fan housing looking down inside at the wire connections. Thanks
I have done some installs like that using a wiremold fan box. Drill and tap a couple of holes to mount the box and then everything would be grounded also. It looks like you might have a height issue there with the blades. I know some of those rooms are not 8' ceiling, you need 7' to the blades.

[Jerry Peck]

It looks like you might have a height issue there with the blades. I know some of those rooms are not 8' ceiling, you need 7' to the blades.

The top of the door is likely 6'8", the space above the door is maybe another foot maximum (I think less than a foot, but let's go with no more than a foot) - that would put the ceiling at 7'8" maximum at that location on the sloped ceiling.

Ceiling fans with those short stems typically are, minimum, 12" to 14" to the bottom of the blades, that means the bottom of the blades are likely at about 6'6" ... need a hair cut? :)