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Re: [TowerTalk] 80M Ideas

To: TOWERTALK@contesting.com
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] 80M Ideas
From: Cqtestk4xs@aol.com
Date: Fri, 28 Dec 2012 08:45:01 -0500 (EST)
List-post: <towertalk@contesting.com">mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
He said his tower was painted.  I bought a bunch of unpainted Rohn 65,  and 
some of the sections had light rust.  Since I planned to keep them up a  
long time , I painted them.  Now, Rohn 65 is flange type tower so it has  four 
bolts going through it at each leg for a total of twelve BIG bolts. In  
addition, each tower lag's flange has an area of over four square inches in  
contact with the rotating plate. 
 
The bottom section sat on a galvanized plate for a rotating  tower, which 
was solidly grounded.
 
I too, thought the tower was grounded...until the lightning hit.   Without 
going into too much detail, lots of damage caused by the lightning  jumping 
from the tower to other earth connections.  It turns out there was  infinite 
resistance on both of my towers at the bottom of the leg and the top of  
the tower.  That was with 4000 pounds of tower, 1000 pounds of antenna and  
Polyrod guys  being torqued at 1100 pounds.
 
One can not assume low resistance at tower joints if they have been  
painted.
 
Bill K4XS/KH7XS
 
 
In a message dated 12/28/2012 9:31:12 A.M. Coordinated Universal Tim,  
jim@audiosystemsgroup.com writes:

1) You  may think that the connections are crummy, but a smart EE friend 
who works  with towers a lot has observed that with all the weight that's 
on it, and  the considerable cross sectional area in contact at the tower 
junctions,  most towers are likely to have connections good enough to 
load.  I'd  say it's worth a try.
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