Re: [TowerTalk] Fw: w7ekb & ground rods

[Patrick Greenlee <patrick_g@windstream.net>]

Just in case my experience may help someone...

The last 1/2, especially the last 1/4 of a ground rod is often much 
harder to drive than the first part. I have used a sledge before but... 
you can bend the rod and then it just seems to want to bend more and not 
go deeper.  Use a length of metal tubing or pipe slid over the end of 
the rod.  You can tape it in place or...  This keeps the rod from 
bending when using a large hammer (sledge.)   I use two lengths of 
pipe.  First one is about 2 1/2 ft long.  When that starts going into 
the ground I switch to a shorter one about a foot or so long.  I have 
sledges ranging from 8 lb to 14 lb and can swing them pretty forcefully 
when needed (6'2" 215 lbs).  The pipe over the rod thing works well for me.
I also have an electric demo hammer (small electric jack hammer.)  I 
made a rod driving tool for it.  I used a piece of conduit driven over a 
length of a regular chisel made to fit the hammer.  Bought it cheap at 
Harbor Freight and cut it in half. One end is used to make the rod 
driver tool. I welded the conduit to the cut off chisel. Being thrifty I 
ground the scrap piece with the chisel tip to the shape of the part that 
mates with the hammer. My hammer doesn't drive rods in really hard dirt 
very fast but takes little effort on my part and with patience will do a 
terrific job. I have never needed the pipe over the rod when driving 
with the electric hammer but there could be a first time.
Good luck.

Patrick  NJ5G


On 1/19/2015 9:19 AM, Jim Lux wrote:
> On 1/18/15 9:53 PM, Kelly Taylor wrote:
> > It seems to me a valid question to ask on this thread: Do you gain 
> > anything
> > by, for example, drilling a hole to get a ground rod deeper?
> >
> > If you think about it, the answer might not be so simple.
> >
> > The point of a ground rod is to maximize electrical contact with the 
> > ground.
> > If you have to drill 48 inches of an eight-foot rod and don't employ 
> > some
> > kind of conductive filler (concrete, bentonite, etc.) to bond the rod 
> > to the
> > rock, how much better off are you than just putting in a 48-inch rod? 
> > Even
> > if you do use bentonite, is rock a good connection?
> >
> > If that's the case, what would be wrong with cutting the eight-foot 
> > rod into
> > two 48-inch rods and driving them 96 inches apart?
> >
> > The point of eight- or ten-foot ground rods is to get eight or ten 
> > feet of
> > contact area, not necessarily to get eight or ten feet deep, yes?
>
> Yes, and two short rods would work as well, if not better, than 1 big 
> rod.
> However, there is a potential depth related issue: soil moisture 
> varies a lot in the first few feet, and in a lot of places, the 
> chemical composition of the soil changes (top soil vs subsoil). That's 
> not really addressed in the building code, though.
> For what it's worth, the reason the code expresses a preference for 
> Ufer grounds(concrete encased grounding electrodes) is just this sort 
> of problem.  A big block of concrete 20 feet long and a foot square is 
> going to have a lot of contact area with the surrounding soil, in a 
> lot of places, so local anomalies of dry or loosely compacted soil 
> aren't going to be as big a problem.
>
>
> > Just curious on all this.
> >
> > 73, kelly
> > ve4xt
> >
> >
> > On 1/18/15 10:04 PM, "Bill Aycock" <billaycock@mediacombb.net> wrote:
> >
> > >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Bill Aycock
> > Sent: Sunday, January 18, 2015
> > > 7:23 PM
> > To: Ken
> > Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] w7ekb & ground rods
> >
> > Ken--
> > I was once
> > > told (Unofficially) by a power line guy that the length was more
> > important
> > > than depth, and a rod driven at an angle was often the only option
> > when rock
> > > was a problem.
> > However, Mr. Murphy ruled against me and I only knew I had a
> > > rock problem
> > when I had only about 8" left to go.
> > Bill--W4BSG
> >
> > -----Original
> > > Message-----
> > From: Ken
> > Sent: Sunday, January 18, 2015 7:00 PM
> > To:
> > > maflynn@theflynn.org
> > Cc: towertalk@contesting.com
> > Subject: Re: [TowerTalk]
> > > w7ekb & ground rods
> > If I may ask, what¹s the ³appropriate tool² when you have
> > > a rock layer 40²
> > down?  i tried a hammer drill, waste of time.  I rented an
> > > SDS-MAX hammer
> > and I got one in all the way, four others only made it most of
> > > the way.   So
> > what is the recommendation?
> >
> > Ken WA8JXM
> >
> > > On Jan 18, 2015, at
> > > 7:46 PM, Martin A Flynn <maflynn@theflynn.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > Ran this past one of
> > > the code enforcement guys in the county. Surprising
> > > response:
> > >
> > > "We make
> > > you buy a UL listed panel board and breakers -  what makes you
> > > think you
> > > can build a grounding system that is equal to UL *and*  be able
> > > to prove it
> > > in court if there is a problem? Buy the listed rod(s) and
> > > drive them with
> > > the appropriate
> > > tool"
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