[Elecraft] Lightening damage

[N2TK, Tony]

Hi Peter,
Sounds like we have a similar setup for lightning protection. I wound up
using 23 ground rods all cadwelded together with solid #4 copper wire.
Everything coming into the house and leaving the house is all tied together
to one point common ground. I never disconnect and most of the time I don't
turn off equipment. 
For sure I saw two direct hits. And on one I was in the yard coming towards
the house as a store approached. It hadn't started raining yet so thought I
was safe. Took a tower hit that knocked me to the ground.

The one difference is I took off the MOV's and use gas arrestors. When the
MOV's took a hit they would short and  take out the driver IC's in the
SteppIR controller. I do have a ground position for the cable coming into
the shack for the SteppIR controller.

73,
N2TK, Tony


-----Original Message-----
From: elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net
[mailto:elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of Peter Lambert
Sent: Tuesday, November 07, 2017 5:57 PM
To: elecraft at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] Lightening damage

Likewise - 3 direct hits to the tower and nothing in the house damaged.
Radios always plugged in.

Do it properly (don't trust me - google it).  Lots of buried ground rods and
copper strap and a single point of ground connection for the radio bench
(only).  Gas arrestors across all the aerial and rotator connections (and
MOV's etc where appropriate).  Radio bench isolated from house mains and all
other electronic devices (optic fibre to PC).  All the lightning arrestors
(and MOV's) bolted to a single copper ground bus bar - the single point
ground connection is from here to the tower ground system.  This keeps the
differential voltage across all the radio connections to a minimum.

The caveat is - don't operate the radio (manually) in thunderstorms.  Of
course it's fine via the optic fibre.

One lightening hit shook my teeth and made me jump a couple of feet into the
air.  Most things in the house with running software just crashed.  All came
good when the power was cycled - nothing was permanently damaged.  To say I
was relieved is quite an understatement.  The 2m collinear at the top of the
tower didn't survive.

Shame the phone guys don't so it as well.  If I get a tree hit by lightning
in the front paddock the phone stops working (either immediately or the next
time it rains).  They replace the gas arrestors and dig up the cable.

73's Peter VK4JD


-----Original Message-----
From: elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net
[mailto:elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of john at kk9a.com
Sent: Wednesday, 8 November 2017 8:12 AM
To: elecraft at mailman.qth.net
Subject: [Elecraft] Lightening damage

Bingo!
Of course the tower is not immune from lightning. Mine has taken many direct
strikes and it has a number of ground rods. The ground system gives it a
path that is not though your equipment. Also a single point ground and
proper bonding as K9YC mentioned will keep everything at the same potential,
minimizing damage. 

Back to the Elecraft net
John KK9A

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