[TriLUG] OT: Lightning protection (was DTV transition and new ATSC frequencies)

[Steve Litt]

On Sunday 14 June 2009 11:05:52 pm Mark Turner wrote:
> Len Boyle wrote:
> > Any thought on  lighting protection?
>
> Best lightning protection tutorial you'll ever find:
> http://members.cox.net/pc-usa/station/ground0.htm
>
> Mark

Trouble with that doc is it looks to me like the cost would be tens of 
thousands of dollars, and it has little to do with your external TV antenna. 
Bluntly, I'd let my insurance company take care of it in the very unlikely 
event of a catastrophic lightning hit, rather than fixing and bonding all 
ground from the house.

My question boils down to this: Now that in the form of an outdoor antenna I'm 
putting up a big lightning bullseye, what can I do to minimize problems when 
that bullseye gets hit. I think what you *COULD* take away from this article 
is that the coax from your antenna can be bonded to your electrical service 
ground.

I saw an example when the cable installers did their thing. The cable comes up 
from the ground, goes into a special splice that includes a wire block 
connected to the shielding, and a 1 foot #12 wire goes from that wire block 
to one that clamps the wire to the house's grounding wire. After reading the 
article I'm skeptical about the diameter of the #12 wire, but...

SteveT

Steve Litt
Recession Relief Package
http://www.recession-relief.US
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/stevelitt