Greetings and thanks to all for the responses.
I have received 8 responses so far and they are still arriving but so
far these are the basic results for the formula for the electrical breakdown
of air :
100 kv / inch
20 Kv / inch
30 kv / inch @ sea level
36 Kv / inch
25 Kv / inch
10 - 12 Kv / inch ( pointed source )
20 Kv / inch ( rounded source )
75 Kv / inch at sea level
And a special thanks to the Iowa guy who said that putting a 200 K of half
Meg resistor across the feed point or at the rig should bleed off these
charges. I averaged the results out ( excluding the highest and lowest
values ) and the mean value is still in the area of 34 Kv / inch which
explains why it hit me so hard. As I watched some of these arcs ( from a
safe distance ) I noticed that the initial arc was about the thickness of a
hair and whitish in color and then the width of the arc grew thicker and
changed to a bluish white. As I could also see the strike hit outside in
most cases I was able to approximate the fartherest away strike that would
spark over the gap using the formula of sound = to @ 1100 ft/sec. the
longest time between strike and thunder was 16 secs. = 17,600 ft away - not
bad ! The antenna this was happening to was / is a horizontal delta loop
utilizing 560 feet of 16 gauge stranded copper wire and up @ 40 ft in the
air, fed with 450 ohm ladder line.
Thanks again for the responses.
73 de Brian VE3SQZ
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