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Re: [TowerTalk] SPG is a terrible term

To: Tommy Alderman <aldermant@windstream.net>
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] SPG is a terrible term
From: jimlux <jimlux@earthlink.net>
Date: Fri, 18 Jun 2010 07:59:07 -0700
List-post: <towertalk@contesting.com">mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
Tommy Alderman wrote:
> As an ex-engineer, I am not against change, but this suggestion is plain
> silly for amateur radio. Every ham understands 'Single Point Ground' and/or
> what it means. If you want to be the ham scientist or expurt or whatever,
> then you should use your own egotistical CPRBP (or whatever) and us hams
> will still use SPG. Thank you!
> 
>

I'd differ on the "every ham understands"...otherwise, we wouldn't see 
all the discussion about how to do it.


Hams get all hung up on the "ground" word and that leads to a lot of 
confusion, for instance, if your shack is on the second (or tenth) 
floor.  You still need a common point to tie/reference things to, even 
if you're somewhere a long ways from the dirt.

I don't actually like common potential reference point as a term, but 
it's worth figuring out what might be something as easy to remember as 
SPG, but that conveys a better feel for what's going on.

Terms change as understanding and situations change, and discussions 
like this are part of the process.

It's sort of like the electrical codes.. they're moving away from the 
term "grounding" to "bonding" for just this sort of reason.  For example 
the goal of bonding (green wire) isn't to connect things to earth 
ground, but to provide a return path for line:case shorts and things 
like that so you don't have fires.  Whether it happens to be at the same 
potential as earth is incidental. There ARE reasons to make the bonding 
conductor at earth potential, too.. "touch" voltage being one, but 
that's not a big driver for code required bonding.





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