Coupla things. I need new Dacron, some I have is from the 80's & finally at its end. I bought some replacement but it's not what I had. What I had was greenish and solid braid, tough and incredibly resistant to nature.
What my new "Dacron" is, is a white center conductor I assume is Dacron, with a black braided sleeve/outer-layer which slides over the center conductor. It's OK but difficult to work with and certainly not what I am going to keep using. I contacted one source who said he sells pure Dacron rope but never buying from him before, asked for a photo of an end piece so I could see if it's what I'm looking for. He never sent it to me so I'm still looking. For the moment I need 500', soon, double that. If there's a known source for the good stuff in the states, please let me know. Now the Rodents, vermin, beasts; I don't know what it was, but I've been plagued with wildly varying SWR/antenna problems often getting a SWR of 9 and then later the normal SWR of 1.2. I'd get varying SWR that was fine till say 30W and then the LP-100A would jump to 9. I'd go out, check things and find nothing wrong. It's been driving me nuts. Intermittents suck. I finally found the little miseries had been chewing on the ferrite choke on the control wires to the remote band-switch. Amazing they only went for the 90 degree bends, I'm sure they'll go for the straight length again (did that once 6-7 years back). I have a Green Heron remote with wireless transmitter ready to go out, I'll do that in better weather. Removed the rodent's teething ring & reattached the wires to the remote box and all's well, just some touch-up stuff to do and prepare to put up an 80 sloper. The tree above the radial plate is rotted, it holds the current 80 vertical wire and looks to come down soon, probably on the plate or remote band-switch. But other than that, I'm back on the air. Sure delayed me getting into the contest on Friday, but still knocked out 62 Q's & 37 countries on 160. Couldn't do much on Saturday but t'was still fun. Thanks for any thoughts on the Dacron. 73, Gary KA1J _________________ Searchable Archives: http://www.contesting.com/_topband - Topband Reflector