Archive - September 2009

Why antenna maintenance is important

I woke up this morning to find my 35m long doublet all over the back garden, it had been supported by a length of paracord that ran over the top of the house and was secured on the oposite wall. It had been up for about 18 months and it appears that the paracord had finally succomed to UV degredation and snapped. Unfortunatly this takes me of all HF bands except for 80m and running new cord is very difficult as i have to feed it over the roof of the house somehow.

If you are using support lines that are susceptable to UV radiation i would strongly recommend replacing these at least every 12 months to avoid problems like this from occuring.