For various reasons my only good option for my shack location is on the 2nd story of my house.  The good news is that there is walk-in attic space on either side of the room, which is at the end of structure, so bringing in cabling & ground won't be too hard.  It is also right over the AC mains entrance with easy access to the AC safety ground.  I plan to install a network of 8-foot ground rods and bond them with exothermic weld kits.  The soil is 'Carolina Clay' but stays moist.  I have read and understood the ARRL book on grounding and bonding.

My plan is to install a single-ground point panel where I'll bring in antenna feedlines through Morgan brand arrestors.  The panel will have a copper backplane to set up grounding.

Here's how the exterior looks.  Here's my plan to wire the shack.

1) I will put a ground bus on the desk.  What's the best conductor to use to wire it down to the panel?  Seems too far for exposed copper strap.
2) I plan to go from the panel to the ground network with copper strap.
3) I figure I'll use conduit that's larger than needed so I can run pre-terminated cable through if necessary.
4) How do you penetrate exterior siding with conduit and make it weathertight?
5) Any pointers for improvements?  Things that I should do on Day 1 because next year I'll regret not doing it?

KF7P has lots of entrance panel goodies but they assume you'll enter the house from the rear of the panel.

1) Good.  Run a seperate chassis ground from everything in the shack to that bar, with all connections on the bar close to each other.  Bond that bar to the entrance panel with a single strap or wire, then the same from the panel to the ground rod.   Copper strap is best, but if you must run a wire - go the shortest distance and thickest gauge that is visually acceptable.

2) Confused.  Is the entrance panel going on the 1st floor, or up on the 2nd floor?  But yes, copper strap is best.

3) Just keep in mind how many antennas you want to connect, plus ground, plus control wires or DC power in the future, etc, to size that conduit.  Room on the panel for lightning arrestors...

4) Best would be to use that putty stuff around the pipe, then flashing above / behind the panel.

5)  In your pic, why is the ground connection to the electric meter shown?  Just highlighting the existing ground?

There is absolutely nothing wrong with a second story shack. There will be no problem achieving good grounding and bonding. Any other answer is ham mythology.

I saw your pic, it's actually a very nice spot, with windows and, I hope, a view.

More than adequate.

You really don't need to use copper strapping. It's overkill in nearly every application. All you need to use is 6AWG copper. Technically it should be solid, but stranded has always worked for me, and in my last station upgrade I even changed to a high strand count (welding cable) to make handling and routing it even easier. You can use jacketed or unjacketed wire. Remember that 6AWG stranded is the standard for utility pole lightning protection. It'll work fine for HF radio, too.

More than adequate.

Smart. And it'll make pulls easier, and leave room for more.

See below...

Use a "terminal ground bar" and "mechanical lugs" (these are just examples, they come in many flavors) for making ground connections to equipment in the shack. You can get them at your local electrical supply place. So easy and quick! Use the 6AWG stranded. I really like using the high strand count welding cable for this.

And that's exactly how you'll do it, if I understand your plan properly. I'm assuming that you'll have a KF7P or similar panel at ground level. What you need to do is put a similar panel directly above it located in front of the attic space, where the conduit from the panel punches straight back into that space. Finally, you'll have one or more conduits that go from the ground level box to the attic level box.

You can also forego the ground level box and just bring all your antenna feeds straight to the second floor. This can actually be quite convenient depending on your antenna setup.

I had a second floor shack for a few years and had zero problems. You will enjoy operating from up there instead of some dank basement or horrible outbuilding.

I had thought that the lightning arrestors should be as close to the ground rod network as possible.  So I thought the entrance panel should be at the 1st floor level (see why below), and connect the shack to it through the conduit.  But am I wrong about the best arrestor location?  



I was under the impression that the entrance panel's ground should also be bonded to the AC safety ground.  Erroneous, or simply redundant?



Well, at $250+ a pop I wanted to only buy 1 panel, not 2.  I figured it could go up high at the 2nd floor level.  But KF7P advised against it, saying the arrestors should be down low as possible, close to the ground rod network.  So that means the panel would be down low.  At least it would provide easier access with no ladder required.

Yes, the shack ground should be tied to the main electrical ground.  Should have been more clear - meaning, your main electrical ground should be tied to a ground rod already; that existing rod is where you want to bond your new stuff to.  Your pic shows what I took as a 'new' ground wire going up to to the elec panel.

I am a new ham with limited experience, but for my entry and shack grounding panel, I used this relatively inexpensive one ($60) from DX Engineering. https://www.dxengineering.com/parts/DXE-UE-2P It is plastic and I am sure not as nice as the more expensive ones, but for me, it gets the job done. Maybe one could work for your second box, I dunno.

Here it is with grounding attached, but before I attached any coax.

And, also, you don't need any kind of special box at all for the second story. No copper plates, nothing. Just a method to allow the wires to turn a corner. So any outdoor, NEMA rated electrical box will work.

A poorly designed and installed grounding may, and probably will create all kinds of problems, especially if you run an amp.

Installing 2 entrance boxes makes no sense and may create grounding loops. Just put one entrance box at the low level and place the coax protectors there.

A true RF ground is a totally different "ball game" compared to regular household electrical safety ground. Based on my experience and experience of many other hams, 2-4" wide, flat solid copper strap is the way to to. Length is important too. It should be cut to a non-resonant length and fine tuned with a dip meter if it goes to the second floor. Just a piece of 10 gauge green wire won't do much and may cause more problems than no ground going to the second floor (except the coax's shield that will be grounded at the entrance panel, at the first floor.


Personally, I only grounded the entrance section with all the coax protectors. I decided not to run ground to each radio, amp, tuner etc. This would only create unneeded ground loops with the coax cable connected to the amp (or radio, tuner etc). I never had any ground related issues. Everything is disconnected when I leave the shack, especially in summer months when thunderstorms are frequent.
You won't believe how many times I had to help other hams troubleshoot noise issues, RF bites etc. Most of the time it's caused by poorly designed and installed grounding. Grounding loops can be really weird. You'd be chasing your tail, trying to figure out what's going on.

It seems like grounding threads keep popping up consistently, like this thread. We keep repeating the same things over and over again.

That's what the OP is proposing. He, and some of the rest of us, are proposing a simple box at the second story level to allow a proper, weather-tight penetration, and to assist with pulling the cables. For applications like this a box at every corner is the name of the game. Only the box at ground level needs the copper, lightning stuff, etc.

You are lucky, then. A single point ground in the actual shack, bonded to the lightning protection/station ground at ground level, is definitely the way to go. The single ground point in the shack prevents loops and avoids a lot of RFI/EMI problems. However, be sure to ground everything: PC's, you name it. Anything that works with the radio(s).

This is an endemic problem with the arfham sub-forum. There are a lot of FAQs we don't have stickies for, so they pop up again and again. Especially "My family lives 500-1000 miles away, how do I talk to them with my Baofeng when the SHTF or it's TEOTWAWKI?"

I do have a single point ground when I operate but everything is disconnected when I leave he shack. I'm not going to take any chances with the tower being higher than any trees in the 1/2 mile radius.
There are multiple grounding rods and a building perimeter ground. The tower has a ring around it as well at the welded cage inside the concrete base that works as "Ufer" ground.
I would definitely connect each device to the single point ground if I had to leave the radios running all the time. Then I'd need to add another 10 grounding rods to hopefully dissipate a lightning strike. It's Carolina clay here. Ground is not very conductive. Would the radios and amp survive? It's highly questionable. What I do is an educated decision. Each station is different. A single point ground is the way to go, including the house ground.

Speaking of house ground. It's not unusual to pick up additional RF noise when station ground is connected to a house ground. A lot of RF "noise makers" are connected to the house ground. Common mode noise simply travels down the grounding wires to a radio. I just talked to a guy who had such a problem. He chose to leave a spark gap between his station ground and house ground. This will limit the voltage difference in case of a strike. I would personally add several ceramic, gas discharge units to further minimize the voltage differential.

Again, grounding can be confusing and controversial. What works for one station may not work for the other. Basic principals of single point ground should be followed. Final design is always based on individual station characteristics and usage habits. Like I always said: Poorly designed and installed ground is often worse than no ground at all.

Right, with the main junction box containing the lightning arrestors at the 1st floor level, the 2nd floor level is simply a place for the wiring to turn 90 degrees and enter the structure into the attic space.  A second box isn't needed there, just a roomy 90 degree gasketed conduit body.

KF7P has very nice clamps to directly connect copper ground strap to a ground rod.  I'll run the best stranded ground wire I can from the shack to the attic, down the conduit to the panel, then continue with copper strap to a new rod directly below the panel.  Then drive some more rods at the proper spacing and use UniShots to bond to the other ground rods.

I think I've got it figured out pretty well, the last thing is to devise a way to properly weatherproof the conduit penetration into the attic.  Plenty of internet experts say "just caulk it" but that's bullshit.  Expansion & contraction will break that seal in a year or two, then you'd have water seeping behind the siding and rotting the plywood, house wrap or not.

When sizing the conduit, keep the fill below 60%, otherwise the pull will require Herculean effort and can damage the cables.

The fill is calculated by dividing the total cross section area of the cables by the cross section area of the interior of the conduit. If the cables are pre-terminated, use the cross section area of the connectors. Lubricating grease is available at electrical supply houses, but it usually comes in large containers. Liquid dish detergent can be used as a substitute.

I have noticed that some coax has a "bend radius" specification. Maybe someone more experienced (that's just about all of you, LOL) can comment on how this would affect the OP using a simple 90 degree gasketed box at the upper penetration. I believe the idea is that you are not supposed to bend the coax at a sharper angle than the specified radius indicates, but I am not sure what happens if you do.

A box is better than a conduit body. You can put flashing over the box. It's much easier to work in once you get more than a couple of coaxial cables. And even though you are allowed to bend LMR400 to an inch radius once on installation I'd sure feel uncomfortable with that. A box lets you have less dramatic bends. And future changes are also much easier.

Yep, a conduit body isn't big enough to provide a bend radius for an LMR-400. It may work with an RG-8X but I wouldn't use anything smaller than 2". Avoid LL or LR conduit bodies. They are a pain to pull wire through, unless it's the only configuration you can use. An LB (cover on the back) works a lot better.

HOme Depot and Lowes sell small to medium sized junction boxes. Avoid drilling any holes on top of the box. Also, drill a small 1/8" hole (or two) on the bottom of the box to drain any accumulated moisture, even if you seal everything very well.

BTW, I'm building a coax entrance enclosure for our club. It will host 7+ coax protectors (MOrgan Mfg.), 2 rotator cable protectors and several 120 VAC surge arresters/RFI filters. I'll take a picture if anyone is interested.

I'm also thinking about building my own coax protectors for HF. I recently opened a Polyphaser unit and was surprised at how simple and cheaply it was made. All they have is a ceramic gas discharge tube and 2 ceramic, DC blocking capacitors (in parallel). Maybe less than $5 in parts at wholesale prices and they charge 15 times that much!
I'll make a better one myself. Losses will be negligible on HF freqs. Just ordered and received a dozen, 1000V gas discharge tubes from FleaBay at under $2 each. 1000V may be a bit too much but I run an amp.
Caps shouldn't be too expensive and I also want to add a 100 - 200 kOhm static bleed resistors ahead of the gas tubes. I may use static "bleeder" coils instead of resistors.

Also, guys beware that most coax protectors are designed to handle a certain amount of voltage in the coax (center to shield). Cheap protectors like MFJ, only use a gas discharge tube designed to dissipate static and lightning induced voltages over a certain amount. It's all cool and dandy if you use resonant antennas with low SWR. Voltages can get quite high if it's a non-resonant antenna that exhibits high SWR. It can be a lot worse if you run an amp. Voltage can get higher than the gas discharge tube's breakdown voltage (basically creates a short). Keep that in mind.

Ah, good point on the bend radius differences.  That alone makes a small box on the 2nd story level a better choice.

I just wanted to offer a suggestion if you need a ground bus for the shack.

I bought one at a ham fest for I think $35, they have gone way up in price since then.

A while ago I added some equipment and my shack unded up being 2 desks in an L shape so I wanted another ground bus in back of the second set of equipment. Instead of buying another ground bus that I could not find for a reasonable price I used a 1 inch copper pipe that I drilled and tapped for stainless bolts. You don't even need a tap because the stainless bolt will tap the copper no problem.

I then strapped both ground buses together to make a big bus in an L shape.

It works well and was relatively cheap.