Thanks to all who offered the advice....all this sounds reasonable to me,
and of primary importance is protection against lightning. I'm located in
Largo, FL (despite the 9 call) so we never worry about ice, but we're dead
center in 'lightning central' for the US here in west central Florida. I
related to some on the list that my home did take a jolt this past summer
and while damage was minimal, I'm not willing to risk it again. As a
precaution I'm replacing the coax even though we couldn't determine IF the
tower took a hit. Event the remote coax switch on the tower continues to
function. The phone service box on the outside of the house, cable
television lines, and two breakers in the panel box in the garage weren't as
lucky. And I lost 5 square feet of ceramic tile where the jolt blew a hole
in the concrete floor of the room where my office and radio gear
reside....this was along the rear of the home. The thought here was that the
rebar concrete reinforcement in the flooring may have taken a shot.
We're also in hurricane country...I've got the Gulf of Mexico 3 miles from
me to the west, and Tampa Bay 3 miles to the east. The tower is a crank
up/tilt-over with the 12" steel main pier driven 11 feet down..it sits
essentially in water (when we dug for our 6' pool the excavator had to pump
water from the hole due to it continually seeping in). The tower bolts to
anchors on the pier post.
At any rate, I'll be placing those comments regarding lightning as the
primary reason to go with the coax-down-the-tower and then underground to
the shack idea. I have done a lot of shopping lately with PolyPhaser too.
Lots of help from the technicians there. And a lot of good help from all of
you on the list here too.
Thanks,
Bill (KC9CS)
res0959z@verizon.net
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