[TowerTalk] Grounding specifics

Peter Dougherty w2irt at comcast.net
Sun Sep 10 23:55:19 EDT 2006


Hi all,

I'm hoping to get some wire and ground rods down within the next 
couple of weeks but I'm not sure what type of wire specifically I 
should be using. I'm trying to find a way to illustrate a plan of my 
QTH, but essentially I'm going to encircle 3 sides of the house (4th 
side is a long driveway), and a small circle around the base of my 
70' crank up tower with each of the 3 legs connected to a ground rod 
and in a circle, which in turn will be connected to the larger length 
of wire around the house.

To go around the house and tie into the service ground, it looks like 
I need about 100-150' of wire (I haven't measured exactly yet, but 
it's close to that).

Couple of questions:
1) Should I also run additional "radials" emanating from this 
arrangement, out into the back yard, or does that make a significant 
difference?

2) What gauge and type of wire should be used for this project? In 
what I've read, I've seen many different opinions. 6 solid, 4 solid, 
10 stranded, etc? And I'm guessing this will obviously need to be 
bare copper, not insulated! My electrician is clueless about this 
kind of grounding, of course -- he thinks I'm crazy, believing one or 
two ground rods bound to AC ground are all I need!

3) Will I likely be OK about 3 to 4" below the ground? I don't have a 
way to get 'em much deeper than that unless I hire a contractor, 
something that's not really in the budget at this point if not 100% necessary.

4) Where can I buy the proper stainless steel hardware to take a 
copper strap from a tower leg (and for that matter, a good place for 
copper strapping nowadays!), then bind it to a 5/8" ground rod?

5) I'd really like to Cadweld this system together, but frankly I 
know nothing about this process, and the more I read the more 
confused I become, and the more it seems the only way I can do this 
is by investing some very heavy-duty dollars (special molds, ignitors, etc).

I'm really in WAY over my head, I'm not really mechanically-inclined 
and would appreciate any help I can get here by those who understand 
such things. I'm afraid that translating theory into practice is not 
something I'm comfortable with, alas!

Thanks in advance.



Cheers,

Peter,
W2IRT 




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