I would think you would want that to be a bare ground wire that is also bonded
to the down at regular intervals.
Otherwise you could have a difference of potential between this ground wire and
the tower.
Did he say if it was bare or insulated? What was the gauge?
From: Rhys Cuff (Latrobe IT)
Sent: Wednesday, July 17, 2019 3:46 PM
To: AnimalFarm Microwave Users Group
Subject: Re: [AFMUG] [spam-se] Re: Best Practices
I was reading on the netonix forum about tower grounding.
The chap that runs the forum runs ground wire to the top of the towers to a
bus, then to each radio.
Then bonds with electrical ground as well as earth rods
He said he’s stopped having any radio problems since then.
I lose an Ethernet port every few months, thinking this would help.
Thanks again for all your responses.
Rhys
Sent from my iPhone
On 18 Jul 2019, at 6:13 am, Adam Moffett <dmmoff...@gmail.com> wrote:
Do you guys ground all your base radios?
Yes.
Do you use surge suppressors?
I've done it both ways. Currently yes, but only at the bottom.
Do you use shielded cable on the towers with metal ends?
Yes
Do you put all your cable in conduit going up the tower?
Depends. We have some that are highly visible, and conduit keeps them
looking cleaner than a bundle of zip tied cables would. The point about long
vertical hanging is valid, but there are ways to mitigate that: You can add
boxes with grips in the middle, or you can stuff the conduit so full that the
cables can't move. Laugh if you want to, but I promise you that works. On
shortish towers I don't even worry about it. We have more than twenty 70' high
poles with CAT5, fiber, and DC power secured at the top, but otherwise hanging
freely in a vertical 2" conduit. Zero problems.
I'll disagree with the idea that replacing one cable is harder. You just use
the bad cable to pull in the good one. If you have grips in the middle, then
stop at each box and pull it at each one. If you have a bundle zip tied up a
tower leg you have to cut and replace zip ties the whole way up the tower.
There's no way that's faster. And let's be real here, when you're zip tying
those cables up you're probably just adding in a new good cable and leaving the
old one there forever because it's too much hassle to get it out of the bundle.
IMO The replacement question is moot anyway....why are you replacing cables?
Probably they got water in them. Why did they get water in them? Because
someone stomped it with their boot, banged a toolbag into it, nicked it when
cutting a zip tie, a bird or squirrel picked at it, or it rubbed on sharp edge.
I.E.: Physical damage which would have been prevented by the conduit. I'm not
an evangelist on this topic, and we have plenty of cables that are just zip
tied up a structure, but I do believe conduit is better.
You could also use a ladder and snap-ins like Daniel White suggested. They
make blocks with holes for multiple CAT5 cables. I never went down that road
only because it seemed to add up to a lot of $ when you figure up what all the
little parts cost. It sounds like a good way in principle.
Do you use steel cable ties?
No
Do you put some kind of grease or spray on the cat5 end before you set in
place?
No, but nor do I object to the practice.
Do you use stainless steel guy wires?
Stainless never occurred to me. I didn't know that was an option.
Structural steel has higher tensile strength than stainless, and hot dip
galvanized isn't going to rust in your lifetime unless you've got a galvanic
corrosion thing going on.
-Adam
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