[BC] LAN Weirdness (Ground is ground)

[Tom Taggart]

"A situation with the neutral bonded to ground anywhere outside the
distribution panel or service entrance is a serious problem."

Uh, do you have equipment with an antenna connection?  And does it  
have a three wire power cord? Gee, now it is likely that your neutral  
is "bonded to ground outside the service entrance" just as soon as you  
plug the unit in.  The neutral and safety ground are connected  
together at the panel. The shield side of the antenna connector is  
connected to the chassis of the device, as, one would assume, so is  
the third wire ground.  So now the neutral is connected to ground both  
at the panel and to ground through the grounded antenna.  Assuming, of  
course, that the panel is actually connected to ground....

What is common around here is to find the wire for panel ground  
connection runs out of the panel a few feet to a three foot long  
ground rod pounded into sand or even soft rock. So it is with this  
place.  Look at the picture of the house here:

www.V969radio.net

The service entry ground is just outside the front door, which is on  
the second level of the house. Follow the telephone pole up to the  
picture window--front door(obscured) is just to the right. We bought  
the house the end of October, two weeks after we agreed to buy this  
station; the lease at their existing studios ran out 12/31 (which we  
knew going into the negotiations, and was factored into our offer), so  
we had two months to build new studios & re-do the STL hop.

What we did is pound several full length ground rods into a soft area  
near a natural spring behind the house, connected that to two inch  
strap, ran the strap into the garage up to near the garage door. The  
main panel is downstairs in a hallway running parallel to the garage,  
just inside that door beside the garage door.  Yes, the service entry  
ground goes UP from the panel to the ground rod.  We then ran about  
15' of #4 from the panel to the copper strap. The two studios are in  
bedrooms above the garage, strap runs to both, and to the rack room as  
well.

The rack room, by the way, beside the master bedroom, now air studio,  
was formerly the laundry. Where the washer was connected to ground  
through both the neutral, the third wire, and a piece of wire from the  
frame to the cold water pipe..unfortunately PVC water pipe, but hey,  
they tried...

Our STL tower is on a 50' tower on an adjacent hill 30 feet higher  
than the building. The 7/8th coax runs down the hill attached to 1/2"  
copper water pipe sitting on short pieces of 3/4" conduit--the copper  
pipe is bonded to the tower and to strap tied into the rest of the  
strap and ground rods. (We painted the copper flat black for obvious  
reasons).

When the weather warms up, we'll extend the grounding to connect into  
a "well" at that natural spring. The soil around here is clay, dry  
summers can turn it into something about as conductive as a ceramic  
insulator, even several feet down.

"Virginia Power 'restored' power to a house feeding 120 VAC down the  
neutral.  Of course, the neutral is connected to ground at the main  
panel.  So, a feed, with several thousand Amperes available were fed  
through wire sized for 200 Ampere service (on two legs, so really 100  
Amperes).  The house went up in flames because the wires flamed up."

Imagine it would, if you connected several thousand amps straight to  
ground. So they should have removed the ground at the service entry  
and left the house floating?