Ham Radio Sheet Metal Ground

A very large pizza sheet might be around a meter in diameter or iow 50cm in radius.

Ham radio sheet metal ground.

That s only 05 wavelengths at 30 mhz which is a tiny ground plane. Ideally that ground should be at the connector entrance but often it is located up on some board near an audio preamplifier. Exothermic ground rod welding materials. Antenna wire build your own antenna components.

Tower and antenna books. Cable management wall entry devices. Unless the radius of the ground plane is a 1 4 wave it s not operating as a true ground plane. If you are using a loaded whip then often the tuning of the whip can be altered to bring the whole assembly back to resonance.

It also depends on whether a ham is trying to hit the local 2m repeater one mile away or bust a dx pileup on 20m. A metal pan that is 38 inches in diameter would work well for a 2m ground plane but i have had trouble finding a 66 foot diameter metal pan for a 40m vertical. Anything shorter than a 1 4 wave can still work but it will change the tuning eg the feedpoint will no longer be resistive. Bonded to house ground if distant from house it should not be bonded to house ground coax shield will provide inductive connection so most lightning current will go to tower grounds distant 200 ft cable run from base to house.

Safety stand tower platform. For example a microphone input normally has a ground inside the radio. A cookie or pizza sheet works fine as a ground plane for a 70cm or even 2m vertical but it s a very small ground plane on 10m or lower bands. How to ground power and radio wave frequency in your ham radio shack by h.

Ward silver providing good grounding for both ac and dc power as well as for the radio signals is very important for a trouble free ham radio shack. Zip wire primary wire.