[Antennas] Lightning protection and antenna poles, a Quandary

[Jim Isbell]

I have a 32' telephone pole in the back yard that supports my inverted 
"L" antenna  (32 feet vertical and 64 feet horizontal) for 40 and 80 
meters.  I am getting ready to put up a Spider Beam for 20, 15 and 10. 
 I plan on a 15 foot x 2" pole that will be fastened to the telephone 
pole on a hinge at about 22 feet so that as it is swung into a vertical 
position 10 feet of the pole will be against the 32 foot telephone pole 
and the remaining 5 feet will stick above it giving me an antenna height 
of 37 feet for the beam.  I will use a boat winch with stainless steel 
cable through a pulley through a hole in the pole at about 27' to pull 
the 2" pole into vertical position and lock it there.  I can lower the 
2" pole to horizontal (just above my roof) for maintenance by slacking 
the cable on the winch.

BUT.......as I thought about it I realized that a 15' galvanized steel 
pole would be only inches away from my 40/80 meter inverted "L". 
 Sooo.... I thought, why not make it with a fiberglass pole.   Then on 
reflection I realized that the steel cable would also be just inches 
away from the vertical part of the inverted "L".  Soooo... I thought why 
not use a nylon or other non conducting cable to the winch.   At that 
point I thought I had it licked....until I thought about lightning 
protection and realized that I would have to attach a ground to the 
shield of the feed line where it takes a right angle turn to go up the 
pole to the beam and then continue the ground down the pole to the 
earth.   Now I have another conductor paralleling the entire length of 
the vertical part of my inverted "L" .     Soooo. ...I though , "Just 
leave the ground off and depend on a good ground elsewhere away from the 
pole...........But then I realized that the co-ax going up the pole 
itself was a conductor paralleling the inverted "L".....

Now the question is...."Is there any way out of this quandary other than 
taking down the inverted "L"?"

The inverted "L" is the best antenna I have ever used for 40 meters and 
I would hate to loose it.

Or, maybe, am I being to anal about it and it wont affect the "L" anyway?