The cheapest (ground radial) wire?

[cdev]

Sick of what is probably a marginal house ground and wanting to try to get a long wire way high into a tree, I am also going to need grounding there. I'm looking into the code involving such things and want it to conform to it whatever it is. And then there comes the radials. Ground radial wires are going to be - pushed into slices I am planning to cut in the sod with a spade -be buried a bit underground. So cosmetics or condition isnt really that important. I just want it to last and be cheap. Used is fine. The one thing I want is to be able to attach a lug at the end to go into a screw terminal which I will tin, I want a decent electrical connection.

Copper and ability to be soldered to is a plus. But other kinds of wire might do, as long as I can get a good electrical connection to it. Price is all important. Does anybody have any ideas? I likely want to buy  maybe 200 M. So cheap is good.

[TheBay]

Sick of what is probably a marginal house ground and wanting to try to get a long wire way high into a tree, I am also going to need grounding there. I'm looking into the code involving such things and want it to conform to it whatever it is. And then there comes the radials. Ground radial wires are going to be - pushed into slices I am planning to cut in the sod with a spade -be buried a bit underground. So cosmetics or condition isnt really that important. I just want it to last and be cheap. Used is fine. The one thing I want is to be able to attach a lug at the end to go into a screw terminal which I will tin, I want a decent electrical connection.

Copper and ability to be soldered to is a plus. But other kinds of wire might do, as long as I can get a good electrical connection to it. Price is all important. Does anybody have any ideas? I likely want to buy  maybe 200 M. So cheap is good.

Your post might get more answers in the Ham section, but I ran an Inverted L with a SGC 237 at the base, the long wire went 300ft and I had lots of copper earth rods from an electrical wholesaler, hammered them in to the ground and bought a reel of thick copper electrical earth wire and just linked them all together and ran all random length radials, some of the radials I just used thin copper wire, anything I could get my hands on really.

[bmac_2780]

I was recently involved in some electrical work at our local airport. There is  - or was, it now removed - an NDB (non directional beacon). This operates at around 300kHz. It had a radial ground plane under the antenna which was made of standard galvanised fencing wire. Diameter of the wire is about 1.5mm. It had been in the ground for over 30 years and still intact. The wires had crimped lugs at the inner end which were connected to a counterpoise. I doubt you would find a cheaper material for this purpose.

[cdev]

Thats a good idea.

Just crimped to the wire? Thats been my concern, that the surface would be hard to get a good connection to- but what do I know?

There is an old rusty fence there now, which we plan to remove.

Ive tried to use the fence as a ground but it seemed to increase the noise level..

Galvanized wire though is far more conductive than dirt, especially dry dirt.

[Wirehead]

Ive tried to use the fence as a ground but it seemed to increase the noise level..

So it picked up more signal you say? 

[cdev]

It picked up more junk. Parts of it are not in full connection and are rusty and there are AM transmitters in the vicinity, I think it was acting as a "non-linear junction" or something.

For it to be helpful, those broken rusty pieces would need to be joined by something more than pressure and proximity (welded) to prevent the diode activity. The current plan is to remove it and replace it with something better looking.

Another fence that contained a continuous piece of welded wire would likely be helpful. I could attach the ends of the radial wires to it, I could also use a portion of the same fence material, buried, to improve the central part of the ground matrix.