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wrote:
HorneTD wrote:

Travis Jordan wrote:

wrote:

How is the best way to go about grounding the hole thing?

Run at least one #8 or larger aluminum or copper wire from a bolt

on the

mast or its base down to a 8' or deeper ground rod.

You left off a step.
and then bond that ground rod to the rest of the houses grounding
electrode system using copper number six or larger conductor.
--
Tom H

My TV antenna has its own ground rod that the tower is grounded to.

Are you saying I need to run a wire from the house ground to the ground
rod? How do I do that?

If the tower is a free standing structure that is not attached to the
building except by it's antenna lead in then you do not have to bond the
two electrodes to each other. If the tower is attached to or supported
by the structure than the two grounding electrodes should be bonded
together to behave as a single grounding electrode system.

The last thing you want is a lightning strike flashing over between two
electrically isolated systems such as between the tower structure and
the wiring system in an adjacent wall. Use of a common grounding
electrode system will assure that as the voltage of one system goes high
that the voltage of the other system will be the same thus avoiding the
voltage difference that will cause destructive current flow.

In either case the antenna lead in should be fitted with a suitable
lightning arrester and a transient voltage surge suppressor at the point
were these systems enter the structure. Systems within the same
building must all use the same grounding electrode system or the
inevitable voltage gradient between the two systems will cause damage to
any equipment that is connected to services that use the two different
systems. TVs, answering and fax machines, computers that are equipped
with a modem or network card, and any other device that has a connection
to more than one wire born utility will be damaged when any surge or
spike equalizes through the equipment instead of through appropriately
sized bonding conductors.
--
Tom H