[TowerTalk] [Bulk] Re: [Bulk] Re: copper or galvanized ground rods in red SC clay

[jimlux]

On 1/10/16 8:56 AM, Roger D Johnson wrote:
>
>
>
> Another factor not usually considered by hams is that conduction through
> the ground is NOT the same
> as conduction through a copper wire! A copper wire has a copious supply
> of free electrons and will
> happily conduct increasing amounts of current until it melts. In soil,
> the conduction is by ions from
> metallic salts in the earth. The supply of ions is finite and when all
> are being used to conduct electric
> charges, the resistance rises sharply. The soil has gone into
> "saturation".

do you have a reference for this?  I'm interested in a more technical 
description of the phenomenon.

I'm familiar with some other soil and tissue conductivity phenomena 
relevant to RF having to do with the ion mobility (e.g. the Cole-Cole 
model which is used for all sorts of things at all sorts of frequencies: 
prospecting for ore, measuring the ripeness of produce, and RF imagery 
of human bodies)


  A lightning ground system
> has to be designed to dump the current from a strike into a large
> "volume" of earth capable of conducting
> the strike current.
>