Topband: Re: Element grounding

Tom Rauch w8ji at contesting.com
Sun Apr 11 19:44:12 EDT 2004


Thanks for the input.  I agree with you 100%.  But I'm not going to ground
them.>>

I'm only saying what I would always do with any low frequency Yagi design.
What I do is use a fairly heavy gauge air-wound inductor with a few hundred
ohms reactance at the lowest frequency of the Yagi to ground the elements in
any Yagi I use here.

It is harmless to performance, and chances of arcs are greatly reduced.

I would NEVER directly ground an element with a short strap unless that
element was intended to be grounded that way.

Not speaking of any antenna in particular but rather all antennas in
general, it is poor planning to have a long element hanging out from the
boom without a dc and low impedance low-frequency path capable of handling
some substantial current surges. The exception would be where there isn't
any chance of lightning and where no one ever shunt feeds the tower.

73 Tom




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