I don't think there are any drain plugs on this antenna. connection seals were checked and re-done. I am not familiar with the desense tests, but both repeater and duplexer were replaced. New duplexer tested at more than 100 db isolation and power is about 75 watts .Problem must be with hard line (replaced already), tower or antenna. In a message dated 8/10/2010 12:09:39 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time, petedcur...@gmail.com writes:
Hi, Juts a thought: Sometimes certain antennas have a drain plug at the bottom and sometime one at the top. You should remove the drain plug at the bottom for normal mounting or the one at the top for inverted mounting. If you don't water can ingress, then can't escape and build up. Another thing to check is the connector sealing. Peter On Mon, Aug 9, 2010 at 4:49 PM, Kevin Custer <_kug...@kuggie.kug_ (mailto:kug...@kuggie.com) > wrote: _radi...@aol.rad_ (mailto:radi...@aol.com) wrote: Hi Kevin, The desense is a staticy reception of "weaker" signals( ie an HT at 25 miles) It had gotten worse as it started to affect strong signals too. If the transmitter was turned off, the repeater could hear just fine. Problem is intermittent and often followed a rainy day. We replaced "EVERYTHING" A UHF repeater on the same tower is unaffected. At this point we think the "new" antenna is failing. Tower sections have been bonded grounds improved etc etc To know whether or not the problem is the antenna system, do a desensitization test directly at the antenna port of the duplexer using a good load and a lossy tee or other acceptable method like a coupler slug installed into the Bird Watt meter. If you don't know how to perform a desense test, there are several articles on the website that will assist you. If this proves good, then you have more work to do on the outside. Let us know... Kevin
