The final trip to W4TUN today.
Once the problems were “discovered,” the fixes were all relatively simple & easy to accomplish.
The N-feed-thrus used on the tower ground block were a tad too small for the 1/4-inch aluminum
channel I used–causing the center pin to migrate “just enough” during temperature shifts or wet weather conditions. Replacing them with N-bulkhead connectors solved that. More troublesome was
the apparent resonance either within or near 50mHz of the Tennadyne Log Periodic! There’s no mention of this anywhere in the LP literature, which caused me to mount the antennas on the mast in true “Xmas tree” fashion–largest at the bottom & getting smaller going up, which caused serious degradation of the 6M Yagi’s performance. Taking everything down, then putting the 6M Yagi at the TOP of the mast, with the little 2M Yagi in between, solved everything. Of course, this meant new jumpers for the rotation loop, along with re-weatherproofing everything. Time-consuming stuff, but not hard (although working on Rohn 25G is getting harder & harder for me to do….).
In any case, everything checked out perfectly this afternoon. Tomorrow we head to W2YV’s, a Silent Key dismantling project. Five towers, again all 25G. With temps expected to hit 100 degrees, it’ls time for readers to buy GatorAde stock~!
stay tuned…
