Billy, at my other QTH I had all the gear bonded. I had two 8 foot
ground rods, one for ham gear & other one for a vertical. All this
bonded back to the ground rod at the meter base. Guess what, took a hit
& it followed that ground wire right to the back of 2 pieces of
equipment. Luckily, at the time, I was working on rig & it was not
connected to anything. It did zap my power supply that was unplugged
from the AC & did some damage to an old Dentron Amp that was plugged
into the AC, but not on. Coax was disconnected. If it had been a
direct hit I doubt I would be here at this time.
No, I haven't been hit here hard by lightning that got inside. It all
has stayed outside. Argonaut went out while listening to 75 meters,
clear day, but 40 through 10 meters was fine. This was a failed
component, if it had been hit by static it would have taken out the
receive section. Low pass filter board that uses SMD to switch bands
was the component that went out. I just added a Alpha Delta surge
protector because I thought static electricity might have been the
problem, but after studying the schematic & talking to several techs
there is no way static could have done this. Just a switching
component, relay in a 100 watt rigs, that failed. But having the Alpha
Delta surge protection isn't a bad thing in the future.
I don't have the large antenna farm like you do. No room! I only have
one coax, Belden RG-213, going to a electronic antenna switch outside.
I don't use verticals anymore, because I get hit every year with them.
Live on a very high hill. No matter how well grounded they are & how
well grounded the antenna switch is, I still have to take it apart and
replace several diodes. I don't care for DX anymore so no loss losing
the vertical. it is just used now to see which way wind is blowing.
So one beam & 135 foot OCF dipole is all antennas I have out side. All
coax is buried up to switch & out to antennas.
And yes, if I'm not using rig all is disconnected! My station is in
middle of house with coax under ground except portion that comes up
from underneath of house. Meter base is on one side of house and
antennas on other side, far end of property. No way would I want a
bonded ground going to all this back to the meter base ground rod. If
lightning hits the electrical line on pole outside, which has happened
blowing transformer, then going to ground, guess what.. it would be
coming right into the shack & if I was touching rig I could be killed.
Sorry, I can't see bonding back to meter base ground rod for lightning
protection. I did lose some stereo gear because of this, but that was
only thing plugged in at time. Now I have APC UPS on all electronic
equipment in house including my wife's Bernina sewing machine.
Bob Heil had a very good discussion on this on Ham Nation sometime back
in winter or sometime last year. He doesn't ground his station either
for the same reason. Electrical it makes sense, but that is what the
ground wire is for in your AC outlet.
I understand your reason to bond everything, but I also understand my
reason not too. I've seen what direct hits can do & being on this high
hill I don't want a strong path to the inside of my house either
through lightning hitting power line or antenna.
73,
Reed W4JZ
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