Ground Strapping

[KC5VTL]

In grounding/bonding my Tarheel to my truck...I want to include a good RF Ground so I'm going to take the paint off of the truck between the mount and the bed so I get a good bond there as well as run a separate braided cable to  chassis.  Here's where the issue possibly arises....from the top edge of the bedrail where the antenna is mounted...to chassis/frame it's approximately 3 feet.  Is that too long of a run for strapping?  What is the maximum length I should run?

[KC5VTL]

Upon further review of K0BG's website...what I may do in lieu of running a ground strap from antenna mount to frame is still take off the paint behind the mount....and also run a ground strap from bed to frame.  That should take care of the strapping/bonding. Comments? Ideas?

[K0BG]

The main idea behind bonding is to make the body, frame, and other parts of the vehicle contiguous, from a DC and RF standpoint. If the antenna is mounted on a side rail, you don't need to run a strap to the frame. But you should strap the bed to the frame on all four corners.

The exhaust system, hood and radiator shell are important as they help reduce the amount of ignition RFI. Strapping the door helps from an image plane aspect, but really doesn't do much for RFI reduction.

Alan, KØBG
www.k0bg.com