[Amibusiness]

Hi bear. I have never heard of that charger. I googled it and found it lacking: any charger that touts how strong it is and how many miles of fence it can charge but does not say how many joules it is is not worth buying. Recommended brands that I have used are speedrite and Gallagher. Premier is also good but I have not used them. Consider: 15 miles of single strand twine for cows, ie out of the weeds, is very different from pouldtry netting which sags into the weeds. You'd never get 15 miles of that. The 1 joule plug in speedrite I have cost about $100 and is fine for bees and bear. I've had it about 5 years with no problems (it is plugged in in a shed). So I'd recommend and upgrade. Around here big box stores sell junk like zareba, which is Maybe fine for horses but certainly would never keep our sheep in, even their "30 mile" ones....
However, how many volts does the fence test at when it is working and how many volts does the ground rod test at the same settings? What is the minimum and maximum reading on you meter? Do you have galvanised or copper ground rods? And what crofter said is good too.
Bottom line, get a better charger. A bear can "sniff" the voltage before he touches the fence. I have heard of bear cought on trail cam that would come to the fence, sense it's voltage, and sit down and wait (because they had somehow discovered it worked intermittently). When the charger malfunctioned he would get up and calmly walk through the fence to tip the hives....
Good chargers and fences are good for beekeepers.... Good luck!

 

[Amibusiness]

"My tester starts at 600 volts and goes up to 7000 volts. I t pegs at 7000 every time the charger pulses. The ground rod is galvanized and the tester pegs at 7000 when touching it. Without touching it is has been operating fine the last fiew days."
Hi beer. When you say the ground rod pegs at 7000 is that the ground clip not attached to the rod? The rod should test at less than 300.... Galvanized grounds are best.
WB what model Gallagher did you get?

 

[Amibusiness]

User, what model and how many feet of ground rod did you have and how much weed pressure was leaking juice? When voltage output is low it means there is either not enough grounding from rod (open circuit) or too much grounding from weeds/shorts (leaking). The more joules your charger puts out the harder it can hit through wool/fur and the more "water tight" it is, meaning if you have a lot of weeds leaking voltage it will still pack a punch if properly grounded. When you first set up the fence a rule of thumb is that if a properly set up fence and ground have more than 300v on the GROUND ROD you need more ground.

 

[Amibusiness]

Beer, with fence set up to run test fence as usual. Then test ground rod in same way. If your tester has a wire with pin you stick in ground, stick it in the ground and put the hot test on the ground rod. So you test it just like you test the fence. It may be a bit counter intuitive but the hot and ground leads from the charger are actually interchangeable. You can put either lead on the fence and the other one to ground. The lead that is grounded best will become the "ground rod." So if you have netting that is burried in weeds and the ground rod is only 1 foot long the charger will "reverse" sending the charge to the rod and using the netting as the ground field.... Did I write that understandably? I'll try again if not.
You won't be able to tell if it's 300v or less with your tester but 600v is probably close enough.

 

[Amibusiness]

WB, 1 joule should be plenty. More is fine. Just make sure your wires are close enough together. If the intruder gets shocked behind the ears it will go forwards. So with about 6-8 inch spacing the bear is more likely to sniff the wire and get zapped on his nose than with 18-24 inch spacing he may just dive right through....