[Antennas] Ground rod questions

[Philip (KO6BB)]

Hi,
Now that I have the antennas taken care of with the installation of an 88' 
window line fed dipole, (one more vertical will be added later this summer, 
thanks all), it's time to re-do the grounding around this station.  When I 
moved in 9 years ago I scavenged a couple new short rods that they were 
tossing out at work as "not meeting code" (4 foot skinny, lightly 
copper-plated steel rods, copper plating now gone) for satellite installs,as 
well as purchasing a single 8 foot copperclad rod from Radioshack.  These 
are strung out in a line and tied together so that "station-ground" for any 
HF band is not an odd 1/4 wavelength away from the equipment (closest rod is 
5' from the radio).

This ground system DOES seem to be effective as I haven't had a problem with 
RF in the shack affecting anything (or biting my lip ;-)  HOWEVER, when the 
soil dries out in the summer the noise in both HF and 2 M rigs rises very 
significantly (have to turn squelch up all the way on 2M).  Watering the 
grounds always quiets the equipment down again.  I suspect that at least 
part of the problem is due to the fact that two rods are very short (4 foot 
rods, sticking out 12 inches).  I forgot to mention that this is a mobile 
home with a two by four yard area, so doing a large elaborate ground system 
of buried wires etc is NOT practical (I wish it were).

I've read articles about soldering a hose fitting on a piece of copper pipe 
and "water drilling" the pipe into the ground.  The ground here is quite 
hard and somewhat rocky, hardpan isn't all that deep (one CAN drive a ground 
rod through it) and I'm not sure that method would work here, other than the 
first couple feet or so.  For the same reason, driving copper pipe into the 
ground probably isn't going to work as it'd likely bend and collapse (I 
haven't tried that here though).

My intent is to 'pull' the two short rods out with a jack, install new 
longer ones in those places and drive perhaps two more into the ground as 
well.  With the existing 8 foot R/S rod that will give me five long ones.

QUESTIONS:
1.  From what I recall of the R/S "Phones are us" product, the rods were 
very expensive, just copper clad (how long does that last) and I'd probably 
have to "mail-order" them from the local store now.  What is the best and 
economical source for ground rods, perhaps "Lowes" or similar, electrical 
supply store etc?  Ideas?

2.  Each mobile home in the park has an individual ground rod at the service 
box, it appears to be galvanized steel or similar.  Would those be 
satisfactory as I suspect copper-cladding wouldn't last anyway?  Those 
galvanized ones probably came from a builder's supply store.

3.  The present system has the rods tied together with individual ground 
clamps and heavy gauge wire.  This of course requires at least annual 
maintenance to insure good connections.  I'm considering hiring someone to 
braze or weld the connections to them.  Something I've considered is, if the 
ground rods are galvanized, tie them together with a length of "re-bar" (is 
that the term) welded to the rods.  I realize that steel isn't as good as 
copper, but it would HAVE to be better than what I have now.  Does that 
sound reasonable?

Ideas anyone?  (COST IS A MAJOR CONSIDERATION HERE as there are budget 
restraints).


73 de Phil,  KO6BB
http://ko6bb1.multiply.com/ (My OTR Blog)
http://www.qsl.net/ko6bb/   (Web Page)

DX begins at the noise floor!
RADIO: Yaesu FT-2000.
Antennas:  Butternut HF-2v,  88' Ladder-Line fed dipole.
Merced, Central California, 37.3N 120.48W  CM97sh