[TowerTalk] Grounding the rotor cable

[K8RI on TowerTalk]

I don't disconnect anything since I finished the ground system installation. 
That's mainly because the connections are too difficult to get at and the 
storm would be past by the time I could get them disconnected.

Since the ground system was finished I've had no damage yet the tower takes 
at least 3 direct hits on average per year. It was five the first half of 
this past summer.  I say at least as those have been observed.

IF I recall correctly Tom said he didn't disconnect anything either, but 
I've only seen one post from him in recent months. I understand he's over on 
the amps reflector.

Roger Halstead (K8RI and ARRL 40 year Life Member)
N833R - World's oldest Debonair CD-2
www.rogerhalstead.com (Use return address from home page)


> At 12:47 PM 11/26/2006, Bill Turner wrote:
>>I've read the PolyPhaser  document on protection for ham stations but
>>it is vague on how to protect  rotator cables. First, I wonder how much
>>protection, if any, is needed in  the first place? In my tower, the
>>rotator is inside the tower and the  control lines run down inside the
>>tower as well. Coming out from the  tower at the bottom, they run
>>underground to the shack, about 70 feet  away. It seems to me that
>>neither the rotator nor the lines
> ``~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
> Interesting thoughts.  I NEVER ran any Polyphasers etc on my rotor 
> cables.
> Everything was disconnected at the bulkhead by Cinch-Jones  plugs. 
> Amazingly
> even though I had lots of rotors on the 200 foot  towers, I never had a 
> rotor
> failure from a lightning hit...mechanical  damage from wind etc, but no
> electrical problems.  My gut feeling is there  are few direct hits on the 
> rotor
> cables and most of the damage from  non-disconnected stems from the 
> induced
> voltage of the hit and perhaps providing  a great ground for the main 
> lighting
> charge to travel to ground through the  house mains by way of a short, 
> jumping from
> the tower or coax to the  cable.
>
> Bill K4XS/KH6
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