Conventional Lightning Protection System

A Conventional lightning rod (Spike arrester) or lightning conductor is a metal rod or conductor mounted on top of a building and electrically connected to the ground through a wire, to protect the building in the event of lightning. If lightning strikes the building it will preferentially strike the rod, and be conducted harmlessly to ground through the wire, instead of passing through the building, where it could start a fire or cause electrocution.

A lightning rod is a single component in a lightning protection system. In addition to rods placed at regular intervals on the highest portions of a structure, a lightning protection system typically includes a rooftop network of conductors, multiple conductive paths from the roof to the ground, bonding connections to metallic objects within the structure and a grounding network. The rooftop lightning rod is a metal strip or rod, usually of copper or aluminum.

Lightning protection systems are installed on structures, trees, monuments, bridges or water vessels to protect from lightning damage. Individual lightning rods are sometimes called finials, air terminals or strike termination devices.

Features

• Exceptional electrical dissipation characteristics

• No antenna and beacon interference

• 180 mph survival wind speed

• Low cost, replaceable dissipating tips

Spike Lightning Arrestor is a very efficient hybrid lightning dissipater. When operating as a shield it reduces the potential between the tower and storm cell by transferring electrical charge to the adjacent ionizing air molecules. This transference represents dissipation or the controlled leakage of the charge, thus reducing the probability of a lightning strike. If the electric charge accumulation rate far exceeds the dissipation rate the spike arrestor will divert a lightning strike away from the protected equipment and toward a safe, predetermined path to earth.

Conventional Lightning Protection System comprises:

Lightning Rod (interception system):- lightning rod (Spike arrester) or lightning conductor is a metal rod made of Copper, GI, and SS, which is mounted on top of a building for discharge of lightning current from cloud.

Down Conductor (Arrester):- A conductor is a material which contains movable electric charges. In metallic conductors such as copper or aluminum, GI the movable charged particles are electrons and its help to make fast discharge of Lightning energy. Present in flat as well as round. This conductor is connected between Lightning rod and earth pit for making a discharge path.

Earthing: In Lightning discharge, a chemical earthing (grounding) system defines the electrical potential of the conductors relative to that of the Earth's conductive surface.. Lightning protection systems are special grounding systems designed to safely conduct the extremely high voltage currents associated with lightning strikes.

Installation

Installation process contains these following components.

Different Type of conventional Lightning protection system:

• The simple lightning rod The lightning rod is a metallic capture tip placed at the top of the building. It is earthed by one or more conductors (often copper strips)

• The lightning rod with taut wires These wires are stretched above the structure to be protected. They are used to protect special structures: rocket launching areas, military applications and protection of high-voltage overhead lines

• The lightning conductor with meshed cage (Faraday cage) This protection involves placing numerous down conductors/tapes symmetrically all around the building. This type of lightning protection system is used for highly exposed buildings housing very sensitive installations such as computer rooms.

Advantages

• Easy to Install
• Low Maintainance
• Works according to lighting spectrum
• Is not sensitive to bad weather
• Tested in the laboratory
• Low Cost
• No electronic parts => No energy consumption
• Long Life.

Applications

• Agricultural
• Commercial
• Industrial
• Institutional
• Residential