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Re: [TowerTalk] Attic or outside cable run - safety issues regarding lig

To: <john@ae5x.com>, <towertalk@contesting.com>
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Attic or outside cable run - safety issues regarding lightning?
From: "Dick Green WC1M" <wc1m73@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 20 Aug 2012 13:29:42 -0400
List-post: <towertalk@contesting.com">mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
Not the answer to your question, but in a previous house I ran cable through 
the attic and sometimes it interacted with house wiring in the attic, 
generating RFI in the TV and stereo. This typically happened when running into 
a marginal match at high power.

To avoid this, and to get the best lightning protection, I would bring the 
cables all the way down the tower to the ground and bond the shields to the 
bottom of the tower. The tower should have a proper ground system consisting of 
multiple radials (say, about 50' long) with 8-foot ground rods Cadwelded to the 
radials every 16 feet. Then run the cables shallow-buried around the house to 
the shack entrance, which should have a bulkhead entrance connected to a 
single-point ground consisting of multiple radials and ground rods, same as at 
the tower. The tower ground and singe-point ground should be bonded together 
with a separate run of buried ground wire, with 8-foot ground rods Cadwelded 
every 16 feet.

Yeah, it's a lot of work and expense, but worth it from a safety perspective.

73, Dick WC1M


> -----Original Message-----
> From: John Harper [mailto:john@ae5x.com]
> Sent: Monday, August 20, 2012 7:45 AM
> To: towertalk@contesting.com
> Subject: [TowerTalk] Attic or outside cable run - safety issues
> regarding lightning?
> 
> >From a safety standpoint (lighning), is there any reason not to run
> >coax
> through an attic for the length of a house? My new tower is located at
> the opposite end of the house from the shack and I'd prefer to go the
> more direct route through the attic. That would save me 25 feet or cable
> and would look neater. But if there are issues of safety, they'll take
> priority.
> 
> Tnx/73,
> 
> John Harper AE5X
> http://www.ae5x.com/blog
> 
> 
> 


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