Failed Rotor

Yep, a closer inspection revealed that the light-duty rotor that I'd been using to turn my hex beam was toast.  When I opened the bottom door to inspect if perhaps a wire had come loose, plastic gear parts fell out immediately.  Once I removed most of the weight of the antenna from the rotor I found that it would still respond somewhat, but the motor was so weak that I could prevent it from turning simply from touching it with my hand.  This kind of confused me since I sort of suspected that my rough handling of the mast when raising it the other day might have damaged the gearing, but the motor's weak behavior was unexpected.

Nevertheless, as I saw it, I had two options.  Run out to Radio Shack...er, "The Shack", and buy another $70-$80 rotor to get things operational in a hurry, or plunk down the cash for a ham-duty rotor which would mean ordering online and a waiting period.  Just how important was instant gratification?

There was another factor that came into play actually.  I had someone at my house who could help me lift the antenna again and raise the mast back to the 45 foot level, but they were only going to be there for a few more hours...a few more hours today.  That was almost enough to sway me to run out to buy another light-duty rotor (heck, I could buy nearly 4 of them for the price I was paying for ONE ham-duty rotor), but after thinking it through, why take a chance?  Buy the right rotor for the job and be done with it once and for all.  I also didn't relish the thought of lowering and raising the mast a couple of times a year to inspect, repair, or replace the rotor again.

But what all of this does convince me of is that using a small rotor intended for a tv antenna is NOT a good idea, despite what some manufacturers might say.  Yes, the hex beam is a light-weight antenna and, yes, it seems to present a profile that doesn't catch the wind, but it is still somewhat unwieldy.  A few folks on the yahoo group for hex beams had said as much and tried to warn the rest of us, but when you're trying to be cheap, well, you know how easy it is to try and save a buck.  I've also heard/read that many of the less expensive rotors are now being manufactured overseas (ie, China) and aren't what they used to be.  I don't know if I totally buy into that, I think it's an easy way to shift blame for what amounts to making a poor decision in the first place.  All in all, I think these folks saying that you can use a light-weight tv rotor are doing people a disservice by saying it's feasible.

Anyway, hopefully I'll be back on the air by the middle of next week.

Hex beam raised to 45 feet

I've been talking about it for a long time but I finally got around to raising my hex beam to 45 feet. It had been at about 25 feet since I installed it last December. Man, what a difference it's made! The noise level that I suffered from has all but disappeared and I'm finally getting the kind of results that I had hoped for when I bought it. I had never doubted the transmit ability, but I had grown quite disenchanted with my ability to hear with it. The noise level, which I had always read was supposed to be very low with a properly configured hex, was so high that I was unable to copy many stations that were down in the mud. I was very disappointed.

Now I'm starting to think that I was getting too much interaction with the roof of the house at the lower height. Since the roof pitches away from the mast and the antenna, by raising it essentially 20 more feet, I believe I've eliminated that problem. The noise level is now no higher than on any other antenna that I have and I'm really seeing the gain work in my favor.

But now I have another problem. I damaged my rotor whenever I raised it. It will only rotate about 45 degrees now. Either something is binding or my efforts to raise it damaged some of the gears and its now hosed. The thought of lowering it again to check it out is giving me a headache, but it'll have to be done. I'm using a tv rotor, so there's no braking to speak of. Admittedly, the actual act of raising it was not without bumps and bruises, so it's quite conceivable that I caused the problem. Nevertheless, I think the claims that a tv rotor is fine to use on a hex are somewhat exaggerated, especially if you live in a windy area or don't treat it with kid gloves. I had considered buying a Yaesu G-450A when I last stopped at HRO in Atlanta, but like many things, they didn't have one in stock, would have to order it, and I left without pursuing it any further. Kind of kicking myself over that one.

But at least I'm finally realizing what I hoped would be the case when I bought it, good performance. I will say this, some of the parts were either a poor grade of stainless or not stainless at all. Several areas showed signs of rust or pitting. Little bit surprised at that. Nothing looked to be compromised by any means, but still didn't expect to find that.

Hidden Gems

Not much time for posting lately as I've been traveling for work the past 4 weeks. I did manage to sneak another stop in at Ham Radio Outlet in Atlanta (I needed to stop for gas, heh-heh, how convenient), but only bought some coax.

Today I found something that will help me continue to improve my station's grounding. I buried a couple of 8 foot ground rods outside of the shack before I started all of this traveling, but I've been unhappy with the piece of crap MFJ window pass-through that I bought a while back. The puny grounding screw is a joke, as is the rest of the assembly. I should have known better. When I opened the box I saw that the darn plate that contains all the coax connectors and grounding screw was placed cock-eyed across the piece of wood. If they can't get that square, what do you expect? I should have sent it back right then.

Anyway, while working today on a temperature controller I kept stepping on something that was laying in the floor. At first glance I thought it was a slat of wood. But after kicking it out of the way, I heard a distinctive 'clunk'. It was metallic. A closer inspection revealed that it was a 6" by 18" piece of solid copper. Its about 3/8 thick too. This will be ideal for a central grounding plate to tie all of my equipment too. The people who work there said it came out of a large generator and told me to take it. I quickly got it out of sight before they changed their mind :)

I'm glad I didn't pull the trigger and buy the assembly that I'd seen online now!

Pssst. Wanna buy some speakers?

This post isn't about ham radio at all. One of my other favorite hobbies is collecting and restoring vintage audio/hi-fi equipment. A couple of years ago I was perusing some of the more popular audio boards and read a few entries about a scam involving speakers that seemed to be happening in some of the larger metro areas, especially here in the South. The scam goes like this - a couple of fellows will approach you in a parking lot and introduce themselves. They'll go on to say that they've got some high quality speakers that they weren't able to deliver and the 'boss' told them to just get rid of them, rather than bring them back to the warehouse. In other words, get whatever they can for them and be done with it.

The scam is, the speakers are boxed and labeled as a reputable, high-quality brand of speakers, and actually appear to be genuine. But appearances are not as they seem and the speakers are junk. Generally the guys seem happy to take a couple hundred dollars for speakers that retail over $1,000 - $1,500.

Clearly they nab a lot of unsuspecting souls eager to score a quick bargain.

This scam happened to me two days ago while I stopped for gas in Nashville. I knew the story so I didn't fall for it, but I let them do their song and dance. It was actually rather tough to get away from them, and I finally just had to drive off.

Beware if you encounter any of these dopes, I'd hate for more people to get ripped off.