I think I cooked my antenna

[357]

We just had a big rain here and the swr is through the roof.

I'm super pissed off right now.

 

[357]

the only thing I can think of is the wire ends where they are soldered to the caps.
I had to file mine down flush to thread the sections together.
Maybe there is not enough solder and water is getting in?

The antenna will be garbage when that freezes....I had a feeling they sell the duds on Amazon

 

[Marconi]

I'm gonna replace the coax and see if that makes a difference.
Hopefully its just that.
I cant afford to ship the antenna back.


this is a reference picture, not my antenna but it shows the round piece that the so239 is attached to that wiggles on my antenna. (brand new)

View attachment 18826

357, did you check if the nut could be loose? Also make sure the drain hole is clear. Stick something inside of the drain hole in case something is blocking it from draining right.

 

[357]

ya the so239 is tight.

I soldered some lugs on my groundwire and made sure it had a good connection.

Seems this helped with the rain.
I'm still a bit skeptical though.
Maybe a couple kw's will smarten it up.

 

[Captain Kilowatt]

I hope you don't try getting a couple kilowatts out of that amp.It looks like a Dentron MLA-2500 The original tubes are no longer made and they were good for only about a kilowatt output with 2 Kw INPUT.