[TowerTalk] Where to put Lightning Arresters

[Jeff]

I put the arrestors at the coax feed points into my shack at the home run 
panel location.  And also out at the tower base on the termination of each 
antenna stack feeder.  The reason for that is I want to buy some insurance 
in the case of my tower mounted switching and that expensive in-ground coax 
run back to the shack.

The shields of the coax on the tower are bonded and hit the tower's ground 
system but the center of each coax is left floating.  My thinking is that I 
prefer that suppressor take a hit and try to dump some of that HV on the 
center of the coax to the tower ground as best it can there instead of 
lighting up the tower switching and the coax back to the shack.  Suppressors 
are expensive but compared to the other stuff relatively easy to replace in 
the event they die the lightning inspired death out at the tower.

73/jeff/ac0c
www.ac0c.com
alpha-charlie-zero-charlie

-----Original Message----- 
From: Jim Brown
Sent: Friday, November 10, 2017 1:05 AM
To: towertalk at contesting.com
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Where to put Lightning Arresters

On 11/9/2017 2:49 PM, Joe Partlow wrote:
> Is it better to put lightning arresters at the base of the tower or the
> cable entrance at the shack or both?

The function of arrestors is to protect equipment by shorting the center
conductor to the shield. In general, lightning arrestors should be on a
panel that is bonded to every ground in your home and is as physically
close to ground as practical and as close to your rig as practical. For
a shack in the basement or on the first floor, the panel in or on the
wall outside the shack. Also, in general, coax should be bonded to the
tower at the top and at the bottom.

I wouldn't put an arrestor at the tower unless the antenna is connected
to active electronics at the tower.

73, Jim K9YC

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