Grounding
So many hams forget to ground their equipment. When you live in the lightning capital of the US it just makes good sense to have a GREAT ground. Before I get too far off track there are a few types of grounds but we will focus on two, Earth ground and RF ground.
Good electrical practices tell us to have short, heavy duty ground connections. If you have ever taken a lightning hit you understand why! A lot of voltage very fast needs a place to go and do the least amount of damage to your equipment. There are two schools of thought on what should be used: Wide solid copper bands or wide braided wire. For flexibility the braid wins all the time. I like to make a hole close to the end, solder all around the hole and place it over the ground post on your equipment. The key is to make sure you have a good mechanical and electrical connection.
Some people will swear by one of the following two methods: Tie all of the pieces of equipment to a central point individually or tie each piece to the next piece and then to a central point. For Electrical grounding I prefer the tie each piece to a central point method but if you have RF problems then tie equipment in a daisy chain fashion might help with the RF issue. I will go off script and say tie them all to the central point at the end of the feed from the antenna. This gives you the shortest path to ground and might allow your equipment to be spared.
There are other devices on the market that protect your antenna line and these should always be tied directly to ground wherever possible. They work on a surge principle where a giant surge of voltage is shunted to ground. If you take a direct hit, replace the surge protector! I have a standard operating procedure of removing antennae that are not being used and tie them DIRECTLY to ground. In a shack with multiple antennae it is much easier to have one plate with several jacks mounted on it and tie the plate directly to ground.
Since most new hams don’t have towers I will skip tower grounding. HOWEVER if you have a vertical Mounted on your house there quite often is a spot to make a direct connection to ground. USE IT! Remember that lightning will take the direct path to ground most of the time.
Grounding is never a cut and dried thing. I worked with someone who spent months trying to get the same ground potential in World Trade. A perfect ground system was never achieved but the lowest level was agreed upon by all parties involved.
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73 WA2NTW