"KenW" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 18 Apr 2006 12:40:10 -0500, Butch Magee
wrote:

We painted the heck out of them when I was in the Navy, 'course that was
47 years ago, but I bet they still do.

Butch KF5DE
Did that ages ago. Didn't know that old paint had real aluminum in it
Antenna didn't work very well !!!!!!!!!!!!!!


ken...w2bdp

We paint them now, too. The HF whips are all tapered fiberglass shafts
(some two-piece) with a single conductor in the center for the radiating
element. The resin would be eaten up by the sunlight without painting, but
it's special paint that is transparent to RF. There's a need for quite a
lot of it, considering all the radomes on the ships for satcom and radar.
(The really big ones are just "out there" in the elements but many antennas
are in domes.)

Radar Absorbent Material (RAM) is used a lot, and it has to be preserved
with antenna paint, too; Regular paint on RAM would reflect just like
whatever surface the RAM is applied to, defeating the purpose.