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Re: Many Things...

At 04:52 PM 07/30/1999 -0600, Tesla List wrote:

Hi Mike, All,

>Original Poster: Hollmike-at-aol-dot-com 
>
>In a message dated 7/30/99 4:13:02 AM Mountain Daylight Time, 
>tesla-at-pupman-dot-com writes:

>>  I appreciate yours and others responses on this as it's been somewhat of a
>>  vexing issue to resolve. If I still lived in Florida, this wouldn't be a
>>  problem
>>  at all.

>Hi Don,
>   This is from another Colorado coiler.   Nice to know there are more that 
>are not just in the Denver area.   I hope you can solve your grounding issue 
>without too much difficulty.  From what I have seen, there are areas in the 
>San Luis Valley where there is a lot a salt that leaches out of the soil and 
>precipitates above the soil surface.  This may increase the conductivity if 
>you wet the ground where your RF ground is thoroughly before running your 
>coil.

Yes, there are salt area deposits on top of the ground. I see them on 
the way to Saguache and some small areas off 285 before Poncha 
Pass on the way to Salida. However, I live in the Baca, right at the 
foot of Crestone Peak and just outside of the tiny community of 
Crestone. I haven't seen any obvious salt deposits near my home. 
Also, the Baca has all the power lines running underground, so 
that's an additional consideration I have to take into account. 

>    I take it that you do not have a well for your water supply.  That would 
>be an easy way to make your ground connection.    If you have to drive in 
>ground rods, maybe you can use several shorter rods connected with copper or 
>aluminum strap.   One book I read said that multiple ground rods should be 
>spaced about ten feet apart else they will be within the influence of each 

Since I live in the foothills, there is no well here. It is a distributed water
system in the Baca Chalets, which comes down from the mountain streams
and is filtered. Down further in the "flats" (the Grants) homeowners do have
their own wells. 

>other and will be less effective.  This book also said that you could improve 
>the conductivity of the ground by digging a trence around the ground rod(s) 
>and placing a salt, such a table salt or epsom salt in the trench and 
>watering the soil prior to use.  I would think that epsom salt is a better 
>choice as it is less corrosive than table salt and less damaging to the 
>plants in the vicinity.  You may not need to worry about this if the soil is 
>conductive from the natural salts already

Being so close to the Sangre de Cristo mountains means that it has it's
own eco-systems; rain and lightning every late afternoon. The soil here 
is very porous. I've seen it rain/hail from a gullywasher the evening before,
and the next day the soil is completely dry. I'm burning summer also - the
first snowfall comes in mid to late October so I won't have much longer
to play with the coil.

>   If you think it would help, I will be passing through your area Labor Day 
>weekend and could bring a "Megger" ground tester.  I could drop it off on my 
>way to Albuquerque and pick it up on my way back home.   I have not used this 
>tester ever, but it supposedly is in good working order.  I may have time to 
>check it out before I go to Alb, but don't know for sure.  I seem to be a 
>busy guy lately :o)

I appreciate the offer but the Baca is somewhat remote;  at least 15
miles off the "main drag" of Highway 17 which goes south to Alamosa 
and 285 North to Salida.  Neither Alamosa or Salida has a Home Depot, 
so it's a 5 hour trek to Pueblo to "real civilization". Living in the more
remote parts of Colorado just means you have to plan ahead and get
more creative. <g>

I have friend here that has a ground tester I could borrow. I'm going
to lick this grounding problem yet. I may have to go to a grid-type 
combination of ground rods/water pipe through a large area of buried
metal. I want to achieve a solid ground, not only for the sake of the
performance of the coil, but also because I have neighbors that will
not be very happy to have prominent RFI introduced into their systems
as well as protecting the computer systems in my own home.

I'm beginning to understand just what Tesla had to deal with in his 
Colorado Springs experiments with achieving a good grounding 
system.

Don


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"Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God" - Thomas Jefferson