We mount a lightening rod at the top, just bolted not isolated, above all other antenna. From there we bond (cadweld) it to a 1/4 inch buss bar at the top with 2/0. We do this for a convenient way to ground other equipment to the single ground. That same 2/0 goes all the way to the bottom to another cadwelded buss bar just below the cable tray which is cadwelded and then to the ring. If we know we are going to mount a bunch of stuff, at say 200 feet, we will put a buss bar just below that level. We have had better luck with that method than any other. On new towers we cadweld everything metal sticking up to the ground ring, fence, fence posts, gates, everything metal.
Counting on an electrical connection between sections seems spotty at best. We also have a 15 ton hydraulic crimper that is supposed to be electrically the same as cadwelding. I like cadwelding better but if you are doing this on a tower I don't kike the thought of crews up there with hot metal pouring out of something. Both for the crimp and cadweld we use connectors that allow the 2/0 to pass by one edge of the buss bar so you don't have to cut the 2/0. I hate those stupid little loops some contractors put in a hand hold that are supposedly for ground testing that just loop to the top of a rod. What a useless POS. On Wed, May 10, 2017 at 8:41 AM <[email protected]> wrote: > I would bond it to the tower on the way down, others claim that lightning > current on the tower needs to stay on the tower and not get shunted to the > ground wire... > > (Jaime, my fingers may have finally learned how to automatically spell > “lightening”...) > > *From:* Jason McKemie > *Sent:* Tuesday, May 9, 2017 9:46 PM > *To:* [email protected] > *Subject:* Re: [AFMUG] Grounding to tower > Did you tie the bonding wire to the tower at regular intervals? Just to > the main ground at the base? What size wire did you use? > > On Tuesday, May 9, 2017, George Skorup <[email protected]> wrote: > >> We've done it both ways, and I'm not going to tell you that it's 100% one >> way or the other. But based on experience, where we've lost gear from the >> steel bonding method, we went back and ran a bonding wire up and tied all >> of our gear to it and losses went down quite a lot. >> >> But I would also agree with Jaime. An air terminal at the top above >> everything is the best option for direct strikes. >> >> Utility power is the single worst problem at most of our sites. DC. DC. >> DC. Surge suppressors. Surge suppressors. Surge suppressors. Oh, and the >> single point bonding principle. >> >> On 5/9/2017 4:53 PM, Jason McKemie wrote: >> > That's not really possible in this case. What do you think about bonding >> equipment to the tower vs a separate ground wire? I certainly don't want >> to make the equipment more of a target. >> >> On Tue, May 9, 2017 at 4:29 PM, Jaime Solorza < >> javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','[email protected]');> wrote: >> >> I am a firm believer in putting lightning rod at highest point of tower >>> with direct cable run to buried ring or rod next to it. Has worked well in >>> our area. >>> >> On May 9, 2017 3:25 PM, "Jason McKemie" <[email protected]> >>> wrote: >>> >> Wanted to get some opinions on grounding equipment at a tower site (on >>> the tower). The tower and shelter are all properly grounded, it's a >>> solid-steel leg tower. Right now I'm grounded via clamps to the tower. My >>> question is would it be better/worse/the same to run a copper ground cable >>> up to the equipment? It's going to end up being bonded to the same ground >>> at the base, so I was thinking it wouldn't make a huge difference but >>> wanted to see what others' experience was with this. >>> >>> TIA >>> >>> -Jason >>> >>>
