You would be much better off placing some coaxial lightning arrestors in line and leaving the coax connected. Exposed coax, in the carpet, + lightning = house fire.

Also, I hope your ground rods are connected to each other at some point. I'm not fond of 4' ground rods, but that's better than none. Make sure they are all tied together and tied back to the main house ground.

73, Roger

The technical answer has to do with loss. So long as you can afford the signal loss, any coax with the correct impedance and power handling capability will do. If your runs are long then signal loss becomes important, especially in the VHF and UHF arena. Poor coax has significant loss and can account for as much as 3db over a 100ft run. That's 50% power loss. Poor or corroded connectors can add even greater loss. Take those things into consideration before you make your purchase. Typically, you're only talking a matter of 5 to 10% difference in cost between average and pretty good coax. Go to TESSCO website and do a search on RG8. It offers lots of info on the different makes.
73, Roger

Best practice is a ground rod for each leg of the tower, with at least 6 feet seperation. Use #2 stranded between the rods and the tower legs, leaving the insulation in place. Use #2 solid from the tower to the single point ground.

Making connections between the various parts should be exothermic, especially when using dissimilar metals. Connection to the tower legs work quite well with sufficient size bolts and nuts. Use either stainless steel or galvanized.

If you're in a moderate to high risk lightning area, it's recommended to use ground kits at the top, middle and bottom of the tower and insert a polyphaser or equivalent at the SPG.

A large percentage of the commercial industry has adopted Motorola's R56 Standard for grounding and lightning protection.

I would be way more concerned about engine heat disrupting the insulation. The additional few feet of power lead is inconsequential with 10 ga wire at that power level.
73, Roger

"Or should the cold water, breaker panel 1 and panel 2 all have separate runs to the main ground rod outside? Or is it fine as is? "


Panels, racks, and all other equipment grounds should never be daisy chained. A #6 stranded back to the single point ground is preferred.

Multiple single point grounds can be established in situations such as yours. One in the basement, one on the second floor, etc, but the main line back to the primary ground must be significant enough handle any potential load. #2 stranded would be preferred for this.

It is definitely preferred that your single point ground and the water pipe are at the same level. How you do that is up to you, but there should be 5 ohms or less difference between the two to prevent ground loops and more dangerous voltage differentials.

You should also ground the table to the single point ground for the same reasons above.

73,