[TowerTalk] Lightning Protection of rotors/remote switches etc

[Gene Smar]

Ed:

     I convinced myself that Polyphasers are NOT weatherproof and ought to be mounted in some sort of enclosure out of doors.  To that end, I mounted a Hoffman steel enclosure at the bottom of my tower and bolted the Poly's to the side wall, with their SO-239's protruding through holes in the enclosure. The Poly's come with a rubber o-ring gasket that installs between the enclosure wall and the Poly box from the inside.   

     Also installed in this enclosure is my remote antenna switch.  I had to install 0.001 uF ceramic caps on the control lines to ground in the in-shack controller to keep the LEDs from blowing during lightning storms.  But I believe that was before I had installed the Poly protector for these DC lines.  


73 de
Gene Smar AD3F


From: Ed Richardson <ed_richardson at shaw.ca>
Date: 2008/09/16 Tue AM 08:24:24 EDT
To: towertalk at contesting.com
Subject: [TowerTalk] Lightning Protection of rotors/remote switches etc

Getting close to installing feedlines and antennas on the new tower. The
question is how to effectively protect the rotor and remote switches
from lightning and if I should decide to shunt feed the tower.

I have several Polyphaser IS-RCT devices and an I.C.E. product as well.
My plan was to install protection at the SPG at the shack entrance as
well as at the top of the tower. For the tower top installation, is it
really OK to just mount the Polyphaser exposed to the elements? Their
manual indicates that these are weatherized units and should be clamped
to the ground point with the terminals facing the ground. I am a little
nervous about this considering the rain/snow/ice we get up here.

I have seen others that appear to mount the IS-RCT units to the ground
panel in their SPG. As there are no mounting holes on the device, how do
you do this and ensure a good solid ground connection?

As always thanks for the bandwidth and advice?

Ed
VE4EAR

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