[CQ-Contest] Bravo - CQ

[Jim Brown]

On Thu,6/25/2015 6:15 PM, Pete Smith N4ZR wrote:
> Begging your pardon, but I'm not confused, Jim.  Such bonding may be 
> required in your locality, but here, in older houses, everything back 
> to 2-wire knob and tube is permitted.  Moreover, the size of the 
> bonding conductors often does not meet your specifications (you see, I 
> did read the presentation).

That is true in many localities. The problem is that MotherNature does 
not know that, nor does it know that telco or CATV wiring is installed 
by workers who are members of a different union, or that those 
industries havelobbied for exemptions from good engineering practice. So 
if a home is poorly wired, or those well considered building code 
requirements are violated,lightning damage is more likely, and more 
likely to be more severe.

> I acknowledge that the other topic, bonding within the station, is a 
> different matter.  I've done a lot of that to solve AC hum issues, in 
> particular. The only point I was trying to make is that sometimes the 
> best can be the enemy of the good,

Yes, but this is NOT an example of that principle, which I've often 
preached!

> and if a couple of isolation transformers are an alternative to 
> solving all of the pin one problems you point out in modern station 
> equipment, that may make sense.

Bonding is a better and less expensive "band-aid" for the Pin One 
Problem than transformers, and has the added advantage of making our 
station safer.

73, Jim K9YC

> 73, Pete N4ZR
> Download the new N1MM Logger+ at
> <http://N1MM.hamdocs.com>. Check
> out the Reverse Beacon Network at
> <http://reversebeacon.net>, now
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> For spots, please use your favorite
> "retail" DX cluster.
> On 6/25/2015 5:08 PM, Jim Brown wrote:
>> On Thu,6/25/2015 1:25 PM, Pete Smith N4ZR wrote:
>>> But... many of us live in older houses, with iffy wiring and long 
>>> distances among entrances of various services, making the sort of 
>>> bonding you call for a major undertaking. 
>>
>> Hi Pete,
>>
>> You're confused between bonding within the station and bonding for 
>> lightning safety as required by Electrical building codes. The 
>> bonding between grounded objects and entrances of wiring is REQUIRED 
>> BY LAW. I had exactly such an old house in Chicago. Our shack 
>> "ground" MUST, BY LAW, be bonded to those grounds. To not do it is 
>> unsafe. The minimum requirement is via the Green wire in the AC power 
>> system. Better (for lightning safety) to run a perimeter ground to 
>> connect those separated grounds .
>>
>>> By comparison, a couple of 5-buck isolation transformers make a lot 
>>> of sense for the particular purpose Ed described. 
>>
>> Power distribution and bonding inside the shack is what eliminates 
>> the need for audio transformers.
>>
>> 73, Jim K9YC
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>