Re: [TowerTalk] Site Grounding

[Jim Lux <jimlux@earthlink.net>]

At 10:44 AM 10/21/2003 -0500, Mark Beckwith wrote:
> I just wrote:
>
> >Does it make sense to bury some length of flashing
> >instead of driving a rod, then?  Is depth an
>
> ...uh, "issue?"
>
> This one got away before I finished typing.  I hate it when that
>
> Mark, N5OT

Indeed, it's more of a surface area in contact with the soil than a depth 
of penetration issue.  Burying the rod horizontally in a trench a foot deep 
is probably as good as driving it 10 feet deep.

Recall though, that a "ground" can serve several functions: RF grounds can 
actually be insulated (since the capacitive coupling from wire to soil is 
substantial); Lightning grounds need to take very high peak currents (and 
also have DC conductivity); Electrical safety grounds need to carry 
sufficient current to insure that circuit breakers trip and that the 
enclosure of device with a fault remains safe to touch; Signal common is 
yet another "ground", where you're concerned about common mode voltages, etc. 

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