how many of you have a good grounding system for your shack and antenna? Go you use a common ground we’re inside and out are grounded as one or a separate for inside the shack and antenna? Polyphaser, ground bars, ground rods or copper piping .........?
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Shack Grounding
- Thread starter Crambone
- Start date
I just have a single copper rod ground on the base of the antenna mast at the moment. Have one directly outside the shack but don't use it anymore. I know, people are going to say why, what are you doing? But I don't care, I do fine with what I have with no ill effects and less complication. Couldn't care less to be perfectly honest.
ALL safety grounds should be tied to one COMMON ground.
You might very well change that attitude when Thor throws his mighty hammer Mjolnir at you. All is great until that happens and it only needs to happen once. I know a guy that had an A99 on his house and a single ground rod at the base. $30,000 later after the fire department left and his kitchen cabinets were blown off the walls he decided to do things differently. His radio was in the kitchen and the coax was run behind the cabinets along the wall.
Was he one of those guys that runs a light gauge ground wire all the way up the pole and connects it to the antenna as half assed as possible?
Ground rod outside and a lightning arrestor for coax..I think it's an array solutions model. Here's a good video on grounding -
Station grounds are more important than the gear you use. It can keep RF power out of your house Not to mention increasing your safety as an operator. I worked in a TV shop way back when and I got shocked a lot of times just but touching a magnifier light and the chassis of a stereo, or TV. Good grounds would have eliminated that risk.
The documentation by MOTOROLA is always top notch. You could be sure your station was right because Engineering has to sign off on it. All the Engineers were EE types with at least a Associate degrees. Most had Master degrees and one had a PHD. The PHD was a spooky individual.
The documentation by MOTOROLA is always top notch. You could be sure your station was right because Engineering has to sign off on it. All the Engineers were EE types with at least a Associate degrees. Most had Master degrees and one had a PHD. The PHD was a spooky individual.
Nice example of good practice above!
The Ham links below offer some really nice products. Yes not junk price wise … Good Quality products!
I look at it this way...Take the cost of Radio's/Antennas/TV's stereo's etc....add all together what's it worth!
Ounce of prevention...worth a pound of OH SH*T!
http://www.kf7p.com/KF7P/Shack_Ground_Bar.html
http://www.kf7p.com/KF7P/Products.html
NO system is Full Proof, but close-in strikes sure Helps!
Like CK mentioned...Had a friend with several antennas mounted on his Barn.
Burnt ALL the coax's clean thru, exploded ground wires on Masts and right at ground rods entering into Home outside; but NO damage to gear inside, due to good grounding and not skimping on fittings and equipment to do job correctly.
All the Best
Gary
PS: Homeowner's Insurance normally has clauses that if "they" believe system not done to Proper Codes and practices, I have seen claims rejected!
I posted this link in another thread, and I'll post it again here. Very good info on station grounds.
https://www.w8ji.com/station_ground.htm
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https://www.w8ji.com/station_ground.htm
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I'll gladly help pee on this parade. Discussions on grounding can go on for hundreds of years and cost thousands of lives. There are 2 sorts of grounding "systems".
1) Receiver noise issues: Depending on what the source of electrical noise is getting into your radio is, an appropriate radio power source ground may be helpful and may work - solve the problem. Many times such interference is corrected by fixing the problem at the source of the interference rather than trying to do something to keep the noise out of your radio.
2) Lightning Protection Grounding: Commercial antenna/tower/tall building anti-lightning systems are employed because the "show must go on" and these structures can't be "unplugged" when a storm comes along. But for the common street-variety CB'er with his ground plane antenna or whatever ... thrusting his fist and a lot of money at mother nature seems the pitiful waste of brain cells. So lookit .... you do some research and ask 50 guys and 50 forums about how I should ground my antenna pole against lightning and tell you all this stuff and you go out and buy hundreds of dollars worth of stuff and blow an entire Sunday digging holes and pounding rods and stringing heavy cables and scraping your knuckles and by golly you have installed you a mighty fine looking grounding system and now it's time for some ice cold frosty bud lights.
Well I congratulate you. Congratulations for installing a lightning rod. A lightning rod to ATTRACT lighting to hit your antenna and blow everything to shit. Why tf would you want to turn your antenna into something that will beg, plead, entice and invite lighting to come looking for it ?? Tell me bishley?
If I were me ... and I am me ... I would do what I have done since a kindly and experienced fellow radio ham told me regarding low-end residential radio antenna installations back in the 1970's. Don't fool yourself into thinking you can save shit from a lightning strike like this. Protect yourself by simply DISCONNECTING your coax from your radio setup when a storm is coming ... or even all the time when you aren't there using it and there's any chance of a storm popping up when you are away from home. And unplug the electrical too. Your power supply or 115v powered radio - whatever you got. Just Unplug It. Won't cost you a penny, any days lost working, holes dug, rods pounded, knuckles scraped. You can install a multi-thousand dollar grounding system and still suffer equipment damage if you get hit. An UNGROUNDED system is essentially INSULATED FROM GOUND and will be essentially UNattractive to lightning. If your metal mast pole comes all the way down to the ground .... set the bottom up on a concrete block or a big piece of wood ... get it off the ground.
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So forget the expense and trouble and Just Unplug Everything when you ain't using it
1) Receiver noise issues: Depending on what the source of electrical noise is getting into your radio is, an appropriate radio power source ground may be helpful and may work - solve the problem. Many times such interference is corrected by fixing the problem at the source of the interference rather than trying to do something to keep the noise out of your radio.
2) Lightning Protection Grounding: Commercial antenna/tower/tall building anti-lightning systems are employed because the "show must go on" and these structures can't be "unplugged" when a storm comes along. But for the common street-variety CB'er with his ground plane antenna or whatever ... thrusting his fist and a lot of money at mother nature seems the pitiful waste of brain cells. So lookit .... you do some research and ask 50 guys and 50 forums about how I should ground my antenna pole against lightning and tell you all this stuff and you go out and buy hundreds of dollars worth of stuff and blow an entire Sunday digging holes and pounding rods and stringing heavy cables and scraping your knuckles and by golly you have installed you a mighty fine looking grounding system and now it's time for some ice cold frosty bud lights.
Well I congratulate you. Congratulations for installing a lightning rod. A lightning rod to ATTRACT lighting to hit your antenna and blow everything to shit. Why tf would you want to turn your antenna into something that will beg, plead, entice and invite lighting to come looking for it ?? Tell me bishley?
If I were me ... and I am me ... I would do what I have done since a kindly and experienced fellow radio ham told me regarding low-end residential radio antenna installations back in the 1970's. Don't fool yourself into thinking you can save shit from a lightning strike like this. Protect yourself by simply DISCONNECTING your coax from your radio setup when a storm is coming ... or even all the time when you aren't there using it and there's any chance of a storm popping up when you are away from home. And unplug the electrical too. Your power supply or 115v powered radio - whatever you got. Just Unplug It. Won't cost you a penny, any days lost working, holes dug, rods pounded, knuckles scraped. You can install a multi-thousand dollar grounding system and still suffer equipment damage if you get hit. An UNGROUNDED system is essentially INSULATED FROM GOUND and will be essentially UNattractive to lightning. If your metal mast pole comes all the way down to the ground .... set the bottom up on a concrete block or a big piece of wood ... get it off the ground.
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So forget the expense and trouble and Just Unplug Everything when you ain't using it
I get SOOOOOO tired of trying to convince the unwilling to listen that installing a PROPER ground system DOES NOT CREATE A LIGHTNING ROD TO ATTRACT LIGHTNING. Say what you will but the EXPERTS agree with me. Actually it is I that agrees with the experts in this regard. If lightning strikes a tree it tends to blow it to hell. If that tree had a metal pole at the top connected to a GOOD ground the lightning would follow it to ground and do MUCH less damage to the tree. The presence of the grounded pole does not increase the likelihood that the tree will be struck by lightning. I have seen more than enough commercial communications systems with both poor and excellent ground systems and those that had the good systems operated straight thru direct strikes with nothing more than the transmitter tripping off the air for a few seconds due to high SWR when the strike occurred. Those that did not suffered thousands of dollars damage and were off the air for extended periods of time. Having said this however I will agree that having no connection to the antenna at all is probably one of the best preventative measures one can take HOWEVER that is not at all practicable for a LOT of installations when it concerns multiple antenna systems or where the antenna feedline cannot be disconnected outside the building or thrown outside. If all you have is a single CB on a single antenna go for it. W8JI operates straight thru direct strikes without damage. He has several 200+ foot towers and takes several direct strikes each year.
As for the last part....."If your metal mast pole comes all the way down to the ground .... set the bottom up on a concrete block or a big piece of wood ... get it off the ground." all I can say is sure......lightning has NEVER passed thru a piece of wood or a wet piece of concrete.
I hear ya CK ..... but tell me - What is wrong with spending no money and just unplugging your shack when it's not in use?
My antenna is 350' from my house and the coax is disconnect when not in use. Once or twice a year we actual get a thunderstorm here.
But my amps and radios are bonded together to an earth ground anyway. But that's more my fear of 240 and 4800 volts.
But my amps and radios are bonded together to an earth ground anyway. But that's more my fear of 240 and 4800 volts.
My long story was above .... here's the short one.
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This mast pole grounding thing isn't about technique or money. It's about an operator's INSISTENCE on leaving his shack all connected up during a thunderstorm and counting on (any) protection scheme to protect him. And most people think that's dumb. Don't be LAZY. Just unplug. It's free
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This mast pole grounding thing isn't about technique or money. It's about an operator's INSISTENCE on leaving his shack all connected up during a thunderstorm and counting on (any) protection scheme to protect him. And most people think that's dumb. Don't be LAZY. Just unplug. It's free
We had a really bad thunderstorm here this afternoon at about 3:45. Lots of bright lightning all around the house. One really close strike blew transformer on power pole 150' in front of my house. It went with a very loud explosive BOOOM. Blew bark from a nearby tree onto the front yard. Power out.
I was concerned about house wiring, HVAC system, TV's, computers, etc., and my antennas and radios.
30 minutes prior to the storm I had disconnected coax (outside the house) and pulled the power cord on radio gear.
Power company just an hour ago replaced the transformer. Power is back on and all is well. No damage...everything working inside and out.
Antennas are grounded to 8' copper plated rods and the house electrical ground near meter with #6 copper wire.
Antennas and radio gear OK. Did the grounding and disconnecting protect anything?
I dunnno.
I was concerned about house wiring, HVAC system, TV's, computers, etc., and my antennas and radios.
30 minutes prior to the storm I had disconnected coax (outside the house) and pulled the power cord on radio gear.
Power company just an hour ago replaced the transformer. Power is back on and all is well. No damage...everything working inside and out.
Antennas are grounded to 8' copper plated rods and the house electrical ground near meter with #6 copper wire.
Antennas and radio gear OK. Did the grounding and disconnecting protect anything?
I dunnno.