Aluminum flag pole - dangerous?

[rmcd]

I’ve been thinking of an aluminum telescoping flag pole to POTENTIALLY use as a satellite dish mount, wind generation or tbd instrument. Plastic or fiberglass won’t work. Carbon fiber is too spendy.

Is this going to get me killed in a lightning storm?
Are there ways to isolate? Ground? Or otherwise mitigate the risk?
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[Zeitgeist 13]

Paging Kourt, paging Dr Kourt...

[Abscate]

Not really. If a discharge can jump 15,000 meters……

Just make it so you can take it down to break camp.
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.ssS!

[djkeev]

Is it really any more dangerous than an aluminum mast on a sail boat?

To err on the side of caution.......
Lower it when lightning storms are forecast.

Life has manageable risks, ask yourself if this is one you wish to take on?

Dave
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[DuncanS]

Any time you stick something up in the air, no matter what the material is, you run the risk of a strike. Maybe 1 in 10 to the 17th. Sail boats are struck every year, sometimes with people aboard and everything is usually OK except for any electronics which go bye bye.

Is this going to be car mounted or on a separate pole erected at the site?

You can put a lightning rod on your array with a ground which would work. The car is not a ground. You would need to drive a copper rod into the ground for at least a couple of feet.

Do you have pic of what you propose? If you are in the woods, you will be fine. On top of a butte where you are the highest thing, then not so much.

How often do you have thunder storms with your "dry rain"?

I'd try the topic again with a title which asks the ham radio operators what they do.

Duncan

[danfromsyr]

for wind generation
take a good look at the #'s, there are better ways to charge your cell phones.
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[dobryan]

I'd be crapping in my pants every time a storm came near if I had a tall metal pole outside my bus. I agree that the bus is safe but I'd need all new pants if a strike occurred anywhere nearby.
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Dave O
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[kourt]

Did someone call me?

In terms of the practical applications of a big pole attached to your van, some prior responses have already addressed the limited utility of some of your proposed use cases.

Comparing total system complexity and benefits of wind power versus solar power, solar wins every time.

Satellite dish mount: the extra ten feet of elevation does not gain you anything. Just put the satellite dish on the ground.

Instruments: maybe a anemometer (wind measuring device) for a weather station would have a lower likelihood of data contamination if it were higher, but I can't think of a good use case.

Grounding: you can't win. Let me explain:

If you ground your mast, you do have a more effective system for dissipating the electrical energy potential as a result of wind and other environmental factors, but you also increase your likelihood of a direct lightning strike because you've made yourself a competitor for the path of least resistance.

If you don't ground your mast, you might experience problems due to wind generated static, which may result in little shocks to you and your equipment, but at least you're not presenting an electromagnetically irresistible target to lightning strikes.

We have a saying among the truly experienced in the amateur radio community: there is no effective lightning protection. It basically means that you must accept that a direct hit is catastrophic and its damage cannot be mitigated, near strikes are just as bad, and everything else is irrelevant. There isn't anything you can do, in a mobile application, to realistically mitigate the risk of lightning. People will try to tell and sell you otherwise--don't believe them.

I've included a photo below of our competitive radio ops antenna mast setup. This mast is about 11.5" tall when collapsed and moving, and about double that when extended and parked. We're starting to move towards eliminating it for the VHF contests we compete in, because we already park the van in the highest terrain, and the extra ten feet of elevation are usually irrelevant. So maybe do as I do: just park in the highest place you can find, and retreat from there if there is a lightning risk.

I keep a carbon fiber telescoping mast in the van for raising wire antennas in places where there are no trees, and I use it often, usually in the desert or on the beach when it's not windy. Pawnee Buttes, Colorado, is pictured at the bottom, and is a good example.

kourt

[Abscate]

It’s a fair days work to protect yourself from lightning

And, if you spell it lightening, you get to stand in line behind the dizzy and carby people to get your head bashed in with a shovel.
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[jimf909]

I pursued lightening my van by replacing the EFI with a carburetor. The shovel strike was an unexpected bonus.
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- Jim

[bobbyblack]

Kourt's mention of using a grounding rod is spot on.. DO NOT. I was the main tower guy (climber/equipment installer) in a former line of work, building a series of microwave relay locations. My erector subcontractor taught me about it, if you ground your tower, it makes strikes much more likely.

Over the years, the towers I had erected NEVER got struck, and nearly all of the places that were grounded where I located equipment (mostly water towers, and not even on the very top) got hit a lot. Plenty of my antennas were blown to bits, and the electronics in the cabinets were usually all black. Expensive!
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[Irishcalifornian]

On a side note, don't bother with a wind generator.
Mine worked great, it charged my solar generator, but it was a major pain to transport and the blades chip very easily which will make it unbalanced and shake badly.
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[DuncanS]

[rmcd]

Thanks for the input.

Dr Court. Great pict!

I hear the advice and everyone’s experience about NOT grounding with a copper rod or anything else. And a few other whispers in there but for Vanagon science I would like to close the loop.

If the aluminum pole was mounted to the roof of the van would the tires “insulate” better, in terms of, preventing a more attractive path to ground?

And dumb question. Why aren’t carbon fiber poles conductive?

Thanks again.
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VW LT40 build. Like a Vanagon but 30% larger in every direction and 40% slower even in metric.
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[Team WorldTour]

[djkeev]

[DuncanS]

[danfromsyr]

Y'alls stil have a dizzy.. you just lack a points.


well sure d'em engine swappers and bunker burners don't have one..
but d'is thread ain't about them anyways. d'ey already 'special' nuff
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[kourt]