[kwlug-disc] Grounding for antenna

[Paul Gallaway]

Pretty sure I got the rod from Home Depot and the post/fence hammer
was one I borrowed from work. A sledge hammer would probably work also
but you'd have to go slow to prevent bending it. In this area it could
range from very easy to very difficult to do depending on the soil
type in your yard. The water hose/jet method should work well with
stuff you probably already own, too.
~pAul.

all good things, all in good time...


On Fri, Jun 13, 2014 at 1:29 PM, Khalid Baheyeldin <kb at 2bits.com> wrote:
>
> Paul G,
>
> Thank you for the info.
>
> Do you recall where you got the grounding rod from?
>
> And where you rented the fence pounder from?
>
> Email from other thread below, in case someone browses by thread.
>
> On Fri, Jun 13, 2014 at 8:56 AM, Paul Gallaway <paul at gallaway.ca> wrote:
> My antenna was clamped to the mast with metal clamp which in turn is clamped
> to the tripod with more metal bits effectively bonding the
> three (same as your antenna to mast, mast to mast). The tripod bolted to
> wood frame of my roof so no direct path to earth other than the wire (or
> through my roof...). A heavy gauge copper wire is clamped to the mast using
> a grounding clamp [1], and then run to a grounding rod [2]. I seem to recall
> a separate screw tie the RG6 shielding (from the coax block [3]) to my mast
> clamp which allows for different gauge wires on the same block. My ground
> rod was a 10' (8'?) copper clad rod pounded into the ground - it will go
> faster with a post hammer. The length to ground from the antenna should be
> as short as possible - in my case I had to run 20ft of cable, in your case
> you can probably do it just about on top of your mast and use a very short
> wire.
>
> Save and Replay uses a 4 foot rod so maybe the 8-10 ft rods are
> overkill. They are also advocating 14 gauge wire for grounding which
> doesn't sound heavy enough to me (seems optimistic that any wire might carry
> "100's of thousands of volts" from lightning). The fence your antenna is
> strapped to will likely absorb a fair amount of the
> lightning strike as well which isn't a bad thing (where your house is
> the alternative). Sayal and Research Electronics (Orion?) may carry
> some of this stuff but you probably need to go hardware store for the
> grounding rod. Actually, I think 2 years ago Research Electronics did
> not have it so I found myself at the HD down the street anyway.
>
> [1] Something like this on your mast:
> http://www.homedepot.ca/product/1-2-in-1-in-ground-clamp-bronze-bag-of-1/910033
>
> [2] Something like this on the rod:
> http://www.homedepot.ca/product/ground-rod-clamp-bronze-5-8-in-3-4-in/910156
>
> [3]Something like this for the coax:
> http://overtheair.saveandreplay.com/HD_Antenna_Grounding.asp
> Seems HD also has the coax blocks so I would assume your favourite,
> near-by hardware/DIY store would likely have all the stuff above as
> well:
> http://www.homedepot.ca/product/grounding-block-dual-rg6-rg59/964991
>
>
> --
> Khalid M. Baheyeldin
> 2bits.com, Inc.
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