When we had a backup power generator installed at my sister's over a
year ago, the electricians not only grounded the generator which sits
only a few feet off the ground, but also beefed up existing ground rods
onn both Centerpoint power, but also the ATT phone leads, all grounded
in different directions far apart..
All done with City of Deer Park building inspector observing.!
73
Howard Bingham, ke5apj
--
On 1/16/2017 5:37 PM, Robert Polinski via BVARC wrote:
I have taken several courses in lightning protection mainly for
commercial communications systems. First, not grounding the antenna
will NOT prevent a strike, and may even attract a strike. The most
important part is grounding and bonding everything so it is all at the
same potential. AC ground is very important. House grounding systems
deteriorate over time, Check your house ground rod, you may need more
than one if the ground is high resistance. All connection should be
clean an tight, including those in the load center. (Breaker box). The
ground wire should be #8 or larger, sized per the size of service.
Attached to 8 ft ground rod. The ground wire must not run through
metal conduit unless it is bonded at both ends (will work as a choke,
blocking the surge flow) with no sharp turns. The most important is
that ALL ground rods and systems MUST be bonded together with no
smaller than #8 wire. (Using the above rules) A good ground on one
system and bad on the other will cause the surge to seek the best
ground, That is why is so important to connect (Bond) all grounds
together. If you put lots of effort to assure a good ground system and
good quality indicating surge protection, your odds of an expensive
lightning loss is greatly reduced. Robert KD5YVQ
--
*From:*BVARC [mailto:bvarc-boun...@bvarc.org] *On Behalf Of *Gayle
Dotts via BVARC
*Sent:* Monday, January 16, 2017 3:58 PM
*To:* BRAZOS VALLEY AMATEUR RADIO CLUB <bvarc@bvarc.org>
*Cc:* Gayle Dotts <gayle.do...@gmail.com>
*Subject:* Re: [BVARC] Lightning Strike
Very nice!! Thank you!!
On Mon, Jan 16, 2017 at 1:29 PM, Michael Monsour via BVARC
<bvarc@bvarc.org <mailto:bvarc@bvarc.org>> wrote:
See illustration for the industrial isolation transformer
On Mon, Jan 16, 2017 at 12:42 PM, Bill Dillon via BVARC
<bvarc@bvarc.org <mailto:bvarc@bvarc.org>> wrote:
Hi Gayle,
There's a lot of information on lightning protection at:
http://www.arrl.org/lightning-protection
I think you /definitely/ want to ground any antenna tower.
There was a great talk on lightning protection at last
August's Summerfest in Austin. The speaker had a
contest-grade station, with multiple 100-plus foot towers that
take several direct hits per year. What impressed me was the
use of a system buried radial lines from the towers that had
buried, eight-foot long rods welded to the radial lines at
periodic intervals. Probably overkill for your station, but
it is possible to protect radio systems from even direct strikes.
I can't seem to find links to his talk from the Summerfest
site, and a quick look didn't turn up the notes I took at the
talk. In any case, hope you find the ARRL site of help.
73 de Bill, KG5FQX
On Mon, Jan 16, 2017 at 7:52 AM, Gayle Dotts via BVARC
<bvarc@bvarc.org <mailto:bvarc@bvarc.org>> wrote:
I’ve got a beach house in Gulf Shores Alabama. Last week
it had a direct hit to the house by lightning, took out
the refrigerator, 4 tv’s, phones, 4 surveillance cameras
and much more. Luckily It had no radio gear or antennas
there…which brings me to here…
My NOW attempt to layer my radio shack for protection
against lightning. Like unplug radio, power and cables,
ground radio chassis. I’ve have heard an antenna doesn’t
get hit as such until you ground it at which time it
becomes a lightning rod and as such now attracts
lightning, so don’t worry about the tower as much as the
lines coming in. Is this correct? Sorry for being so
chit-chatty guys but this is a real concern that got
personal with the lightning. I don’t have much protection
at all except a copper rod outside my window with the
radio chassis grounded there. I guess I need to add more
protection. I have watched you guys at field day just
ground the line, I thought, coming off the antenna in to
the radio area, was there more I didn't see?
--
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